On Thursday, Dhruv Gaur — whorecently went viralwhen, instead of answering a clue on the game show, he used his opportunity to spread some love for Trebek, who is battling cancer — appeared onThe Ellen DeGeneres Showto talk about his act of kindness.
“It was right after Alex had actually announced publicly that he was going to re-enter chemotherapy for his pancreatic cancer, and he had come back to the green room and talked to all of the contestants who were on the tournament and we could really tell that like it was tough for him,” the Brown University student told DeGeneres of the episode, which was taped earlier this year.
Dhruv Gaur and Ellen DeGeneres.Michael Rozman/Warner Bros.
“So you know when I got up there, like, obviously I wasn’t going to win the game or anything,” he explained. “So I was like, I could try to figure out the right answer or, you know, I could do something for this person who might need it right now.”
During the finalJeopardy!round that aired on Monday night, Trebek, 79, asked Gaur for his answer to the final clue. Instead of trying to find the right answer, Gaur simply told the host how much everyone appreciated him.
“Did you come up with the right one? No?” Trebek, 79, had asked the college student as his answer to the final clue appeared on the screen.
“What is we love you Alex,” Trebek read aloud. “That’s very kind, thank you.”
Jeopardy
Trebek saw that Gaur gave up nearly all of his remaining $2,000 on the incorrect answer. “Cost you $1,995. You’re left with five bucks,” Trebek said, appearing to hold back tears of gratitude for the kind words.
“I was at the launch party for this episode with my friends and my mom texted me and she was like, ‘You’re trending on Twitter,’ and I was like ‘Ok mom, eight tweets isn’t trending,’ ” he joked. “Then she was like ‘No, really, check’ and ‘We love you Alex’ was like in the top 10 trending hashtags on Twitter.”
The Brown undergrad then announced a “play-along” that he and other contestants will be doing during the Tournament of Champions on Thursday and Friday night to raise money for pancreatic cancer research.
“There’s been a lot of energy around this and kind of to keep that up, something that a lot of contestants and I on the tournament are gonna be doing tonight and tomorrow night is during the finals of the Tournament of Champions that will be airing, we’re going to be playing along at home,” Gaur said. “And for every question we get right we’re going to donate a dollar to the Lustgarten Foundation to support pancreatic cancer research.”
Although Trebek initiallyfinished his treatmentin August, he revealed onGood Morning Americain September that he was once againundergoing chemotherapy.
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“I was doing so well and my numbers went down to the equivalent of a normal human being who does not have pancreatic cancer, so we were all very optimistic,” Trebek said at the time. “They said, ‘Good, we’re going to stop chemo, we’ll start you on immunotherapy,’ and I lost about 12 lbs. in a week and my numbers went sky-high, much higher than they were when I was first diagnosed.”
RELATED VIDEO: Alex Trebek Holds Back Tears After ‘Jeopardy!’ Contestant Gives a Heartfelt and Costly Answer
While he toldGMAthat he hopes to continue hostingJeopardy!for as long as he can, he said in October that there may be a point in the not-too-distant future when he has to step away from the beloved game show.
source: people.com
