Vanna White Spins on Pat Sajak’s Exit: Their Friendship Endures!

by

You’ll be spinning over this update.

After Pat Sajak’s departure from Wheel of Fortune at the end of the previous season, Vanna White and he have shared their current relationship status.

Vanna, aged 68, stated during an interview with TV Insider on the 24th of April that he is still a part of her life. They remain friends and even share meals together.

She described their friendship as feeling akin to putting on something incredibly cozy, and she meant it in the most positive sense. Simply put, it’s just effortlessly comfortable.

To be honest, they’re such a tight duo that Vanna admitted finding his departure hard to comprehend was quite challenging for her.

She confided that it felt melancholic for her since [at that moment], she wasn’t aware of what lay ahead, which she expressed. “It marked the conclusion of an incredible chapter!” is another way to put it.

But you don’t need to buy a vowel to get her true thoughts on her new costar Ryan Seacrest.

She observed that Ryan diligently completed his tasks, practicing repeatedly. He also mentioned to me, “I’m not taking over from Pat Sajak because no one ever could. I’m merely filling in.” Hearing this put me at ease as he made it clear that he’s not trying to prove anything or step into Pat’s shoes, but simply taking his place temporarily.

And regardless of who her cohost is, Vanna knows she has a pretty sweet gig.

She confessed on Elvis Duran’s Morning Show last month that we only shoot for approximately 34 days each year. However, we manage to produce six shows every day. So, consider my sympathies if you find yourself feeling a bit envious.

When informed that it equates to 331 days of leave annually, Vanna playfully remarked, “I’ve never considered it from that perspective before.

For more behind-the-scenes secrets about Wheel of Fortune, keep spinning…

1. Originally developed by Merv Griffin, the game show known as Wheel of Fortune initially aired on NBC in 1975 and was inspired by the classic word game Hangman.

2. Pat Sajak assumed the hosting duties in 1981, with Vanna White joining as co-host the following year. In 1983, Wheel of Fortune transitioned to syndication. The spinoff series Celebrity Wheel of Fortune made its debut on ABC in 2021.

3. Born in Chicago, Pat Sajak kickstarted his career in broadcasting. As per his biography, he enlisted in the United States Army in 1968 and served at Armed Forces Radio in Saigon during his time in Vietnam. Post-military service, Pat continued to work at various radio and TV stations, where he held positions such as staff announcer, talk show host, and weatherman.

In an interesting twist of fate, while working as a star weatherman in Los Angeles, Pat received a call from Merv Griffin asking if he’d be interested in hosting Wheel of Fortune. In a June 2024 video conversation with his daughter Maggie Sajak and Wheel of Fortune social correspondent, Pat recalled, “I remember my first thought was ‘There’s nothing for me to do.’ I mean, ‘Yes, there are three R’s’ is not exactly a career mover… Shows you what I know.”

4. Regarding Vanna, she hails from South Carolina. Her biography mentions that she attended a fashion design school in Atlanta and later ventured into modeling. Subsequently, she moved to Los Angeles to explore acting opportunities. It was here that she caught Merv’s attention and auditioned for Wheel of Fortune. In an interview with CBS 58 in 2019, Vanna shared that she was the most anxious among the 200 girls who auditioned.

5. Interestingly, Wheel of Fortune disclosed that the initial letter Vanna illuminated on the puzzle board was ‘T’.

6. On a related note, Jim Thornton became the announcer for Wheel of Fortune in 2011. Prior to this, he lent his voice to various films, TV shows, and commercials such as Monsters, Inc., Rugrats, and Celebrity Deathmatch.

1. By the time Pat retires in June 2024, he and Vanna would have been part of over 8,000 episodes of Wheel of Fortune, spanning across 41 seasons of syndication.

2. Interestingly, he was granted a Guinness World Records title in 2019 for the longest career as a game show host on a single show.

3. Vanna has also made her mark. In 2013, she was awarded the “most frequent clapper” title by Guinness World Records, with them estimating she clapped at least 3,480,864 times across 30 seasons. That equates to approximately 606 claps per show, as stated by the organization.

1. Weekly, “Wheel of Fortune” garners over 20 million viewers, as stated in a 2023 press release.

2. Now, let’s discuss the prizes. The show reported giving away approximately 600 cars to contestants across 41 seasons, based on 2024 data.

3. Moreover, it had also awarded close to 5,000 vacations by that time.

4. And for those who might be curious about the monetary prizes, the show announced in the past that it has distributed over $324 million in cash and prizes.

14. Vanna has walked an impressive distance on the game board, equal to two marathons (approximately 52 miles) according to the show’s data.

15. Regarding her stunning gowns, Vanna has donned over 7,000 of them, but sadly she doesn’t get to keep them.

16. Incredibly, for almost four decades, Vanna avoided wearing the same outfit twice. In a September 2020 video shared on social media, she said, “For the first time ever, I wore the same dress twice after 7,000 dresses! Ugh, this is so 2020.

17. The essence of “Wheel of Fortune” lies in its namesake wheel, and this one is quite substantial, tipping the scales at 2,400 pounds according to ABC News.

18. It’s unique indeed! ABC News shared that the show transports this one-of-a-kind wheel by dismantling it for travel and then reassembling it at each destination, usually accompanied by over a million pounds of equipment.

19. Additionally, ABC News reveals that the Bonus Wheel is stocked with more than 24 envelopes brimming with prizes.

20. If you’re unsure about how the show operates, let Vanna clarify for you. In an interview with WLKY in 2015, she said, “We film for just four days, but we produce six shows each day.”

21. Regarding the puzzle board, Wheel of Fortune received a new one in 2022 that’s now one large screen.

22. As Vanna explained in a YouTube video in 2021, “We’ve switched to using a laser this year.” She added, “I don’t even have to touch it anymore. I just need to place my hand near it.”

23. Have you ever wondered how Pat knows the exact number of letters in a puzzle so quickly? Well, he’s eager to solve that mystery. In a 2021 YouTube video, he explained that the team behind the scenes listens carefully to ensure the correct letter is called and then passes the accurate count to him via a TV screen that he can see from his hosting position on set.

24. In addition, there’s a previously used letter board available for contestants to monitor which consonants and vowels have been utilized already.

“This isn’t something you see at home, but our players do,” Pat noted in the same video. “So whenever a letter is called, it gets removed from the board, and the light associated with it turns off, indicating that it should not be chosen again – unless they do choose it again…I joke about our players, but I certainly understand the pressures they’re facing.”

25. If you enjoy solving Toss Up puzzles, you can thank Pat for that. As he explained, Wheel of Fortune was encountering a problem:

“How can we generate more content without consuming too much time?” Pat told Maggie. “So I came up with the Toss Up puzzles, and they’ve proven to be very successful. Our producer then added the Triple Toss Up, and later I proposed the $10,000 reward if all three are correctly guessed – since it’s not my money, I don’t mind!”

26. In January 2015, reporter Christopher Ingraham published an analysis in The Washington Post that examined 1,546 final bonus puzzles from 2007 to that year. Based on his study, he concluded that H, G, P and O were the letters most likely to appear in these puzzles at that time (since contestants are already provided with R, S, T, L, N, and E). However, Ingraham found that players chose these letters less often than they selected C, D, M, and A – even though, according to his analysis, the latter set of letters appeared less frequently back then.

Read More

2025-04-26 05:17