Regis Philbin, iconic television host, dead at 88
The former host died of natural causes, his family says
Fox News
By Melissa Roberto
July 25, 2020
Regis Philbin, the iconic television personality best-known
for his hosting duties on "Live! with Regis and Kelly" and "Who
Wants to Be a Millionaire," has died at the age of 88.
"We are deeply saddened to share that our beloved Regis
Philbin passed away last night of natural causes, one month shy of his 89th
birthday," his family said.
"His family and friends are forever grateful for the
time we got to spend with him -- for his warmth, his legendary sense of humor,
and his singular ability to make every day into something worth talking about.
We thank his fans and admirers for their incredible support over his 60-year
career and ask for privacy as we mourn his loss."
A New York
native, Regis Francis Xavier Philbin was born on August 25, 1931. He was named
after his father's alma mater, Manhattan's Regis High
School. Philbin graduated from Cardinal Hayes
High School in the Bronx
before going on to Notre Dame, where he majored in sociology.
After college, Philbin joined the U.S. Navy. He then
embarked on his decades-long career in television as a stagehand and a delivery
boy for a station in Los Angeles,
Calif. Quickly after, he became a
news writer and was offered a job as a sportscaster.
Philbin went on to San
Diego as a news anchor for KOGO-TV. His first
shot at national exposure came a few years later as the sidekick to Joey Bishop
on ABC's "The Joey Bishop Show." Philbin then moved on to KHJ-TV in Los Angeles where he
hosted "That Regis Philbin Show." The show was canceled due to ratings
powerhouse Johnny Carson but it brought Philbin to the midwest for "Regis
Philbin's Saturday Night in St. Louis."
After three years of commuting to St.
Louis each week for a local Saturday night show, Philbin became a
star in local morning television — first in Los Angeles,
then in New York.
In 1985, he teamed with Kathie Lee Johnson, a year before she married former
football star Frank Gifford, and the show went national in 1988.
Celebrities routinely stopped by Philbin’s eponymous
syndicated morning show, but its heart was in the first 15 minutes, when he and
co-host Kathie Lee Gifford — on “Live! with Regis and Kathie Lee” from
1985-2000 — or Kelly Ripa — on “Live! with Regis and Kelly” from 2001 until his
2011 retirement — bantered about the events of the day. Viewers laughed at
Philbin’s mock indignation over not getting the best seat at a restaurant the
night before, or being henpecked by his partner.
“Even I have a little trepidation,” he told The Associated
Press in 2008, when asked how he does a show every day. “You wake up in the
morning and you say, ‘What did I do last night that I can talk about? What’s
new in the paper? How are we gonna fill that 20 minutes?’"“I’m not gonna
say it always works out brilliantly, but somehow we connect more often than we
don’t,” he added.
He was host of the prime-time game show, “Who Wants to Be a
Millionaire,” briefly television’s most popular show at the turn of the
century. ABC aired the family-friendly program as often as five times a week.
It generated around $1 billion in revenue in its first two years — ABC had said
it was the more profitable show in TV history — and helped make Philbin himself
a millionaire many times over.
Philbin’s question to contestants, “Is that your final
answer?” became a national catchphrase. He was even a fashion trendsetter; he
put out a line of monochramactic shirts and ties to match what he wore on the
set.
“You wait a lifetime for something like that and sometimes
it never happens,” Philbin told the AP in 1999.
After hustling into an entertainment career, Philbin logged
more than 15,000 hours on the air, earning him recognition in the Guinness Book
of World Records for the most broadcast hours logged by a TV personality, a
record previously held by Hugh Downs.
“Every day, you see the record shattered, pal!” Philbin
would tell viewers. “One more hour!”
In 2008, he returned briefly to the quiz show format with
“Million Dollar Password.” He also picked up the Lifetime Achievement Award
from the daytime Emmys.
He was the type of TV personality easy to make fun of, and
easy to love.
When his son Danny first met his future wife, “we were
talking about our families,” Danny told USA Today. “I said, ‘You know that show
Regis and Kathie Lee?’ And she said, ‘I hate that show.’ And I said, ‘That’s my
dad.’”
Yet Philbin was a favorite of a younger generation’s ironic
icon, David Letterman. When Letterman announced that he had to undergo heart
surgery, it was on the air to Philbin, who was also there for Letterman’s first
day back after his recovery.
Letterman returned the favor, appearing on Philbin’s show
when he went back on the air in April 2007 after undergoing heart bypass
surgery.
In a 2008 interview with the Associated Press, Philbin said
he saw “getting the best out of your guests” as “a specialty."
"The time constraints mean you’ve got to get right to
the point, you’ve got to make it pay off, go to commercial, start again. Play
that clip. Say goodbye,” he said.
The gentle bickering and eye-rolling exasperation in Philbin
and Gifford’s onscreen relationship was familiar to anyone in a long-lasting
relationship.
“No arguments, no harsh words in all this time,” Philbin
told a theater audience in 2000. “Well, there was the time I didn’t talk to her
for two weeks. Didn’t want to interrupt her.”
Gifford left the show in 2000. After a tryout period for a
replacement, soap star Ripa, then best known for “All My
Children," filled the slot.
The same hustler who parked cars in Hollywood worked just as hard to land the job
on “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire.”
“I begged my way on,” he told People magazine. “There was a
short list, and I wasn’t on it. I called my agent, and we made a full assault
on ABC in L.A.”
The audience responded to Philbin’s warm, comic touch in the
role. He later jokingly referred to himself as the man who saved ABC. It wasn’t
complete hyperbole: ABC was suffering in the ratings before the game became a
smash success. Forbes reported that two-thirds of ABC’s operating profit in
2000 was due to “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire.”
“It’s better to be hot,” he told the AP. “It’s fun. I know
this business. I was perfectly content with my morning show. People would ask
me, 'What’s next?’ There is nothing next. There are no more mountains for me to
climb. Believe me when I tell you, all I wanted when I started this show in
1961 was to be a success nationally.”
The prime-time game burned out quickly because of overuse
and ended in 2002.
Philbin enjoyed a side career as a singer that began when he
sang “Pennies from Heaven” to Bing Crosby on Bishop’s show. He said a record
company called him the next day, and he made an album.
Even though the series “Regis Philbin’s Health Styles,” on
Lifetime in the 1980s, was part of his lengthy resume, Philbin had health
issues. Doctors performed an angioplasty to relieve a blocked artery in 1993.
He underwent bypass surgery in 2007 at age 75.
He's survived by his wife, Joy, and their daughters J.J. and
Joanna Philbin, as well as his daughter Amy Philbin with his first wife,
Catherine Faylen, according to People.
PHILBIN, Regis (Regis
Francis Xavier Philbin)
Born: 8/25/1931, New York City, New
York, U.S.A.
Died: 7/24/2020, Manhattan, New
York, U.S.A.
Regis Philbin’s
westerns – actor:
The Big
Valley – 1968 (reporter)
Cowboy in Africa – 1968 (Bernie
Levine)
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