Long Islanders Jack Nix, Amy Keyes, Dan Walsh to compete on 'Pop Culture Jeopardy!'

A trio of Long Islanders are among the first contestants on the new “Jeopardy!” streaming spinoff, “Pop Culture Jeopardy!” Dubbed the South Shore Squad, they compete in one of three weekly episodes debuting early Wednesday on the subscription service Prime Video and, free with ads, on its sister streamer, Freevee. The series premiered last week.

“Our game was the very first one filmed for the show,” says lifelong Patchogue resident Amy Keyes, 40, director of operations for the Girl Scouts of Suffolk County and part of a team with her friends Jack Nix and Dan Walsh. Their episode was shot in August on the flagship show’s Alex Trebek Stage at Sony Pictures Studios in Culver City, California.

“It was very surreal,” remembers Nix, 30, of Babylon, a librarian at South Country Library in Bellport, the village in which he was raised. “We knew we were going to be there, obviously, and we were so excited, but when you actually get there, it's like, ‘Ohmigod!’ Time freezes. It was exhilarating.”

His husband, Walsh, 31, a Rhode Island-raised event coordinator at Farmingdale State College, says he felt “a stimulus-overload kind of thing. I was shocked by how big the stage was. The ‘Jeopardy!’ sign that hangs above the contestants was the size of a bus!”

The trio has been pals for years, starting when Nix and Keyes met while working for then-Suffolk County Executive Steve Bellone from 2018 to 2020. “We became very good friends after we both left the county and are now best friends,” says Nix. “Always hanging out, chatting, and, now, of course with Dan,” whom Nix married in September 2023. Keyes and her husband, urban planner Jonathan Keyes, last month celebrated their 17th wedding anniversary; they have daughters Charlotte, 14, and Juliet, 9

Popular culture “is really what the three of us are passionate about,” says Amy Keyes. ‘The foundation of our friendship is really all of this stuff. We're just constantly exchanging, ‘Oh, this new album is coming out’ or ‘Here's this movie review.’ We go together to shows at The Gateway,” the Bellport theater officially known as The Performing Arts Center of Suffolk County.

As well, she says, “My husband and I hosted bar trivia nights years ago, and Jack and Dan are on a trivia team that plays every week” at Bay Shore’s Destination Unknown Beer Company. “So it really seemed like the stars aligned.”

The team’s name was not their original choice. “We had another name planned that was a reference to a podcast the three of us really love to listen to,” says Nix, “but it ended up being trademarked. So we had to come up with a new name. And I’m very proud of being from Long Island and Long Island's a big part of our lives so we made it Long Island-centric.”

The show’s host, “Saturday Night Live” star Colin Jost, “really liked the name,” he adds. “I think he summers here,” in the Hamptons.

“Yeah, he was very familiar with Long Island Rail Road!” chuckles Keyes. “He specifically talked about the railroad — he knew the stops!”

The team will be at the Patchogue bar-restaurant and indoor golf facility Birdies Wednesday night at 8 for a watch party.