Commissar SFLUFAN Posted August 19 Share Posted August 19 Phil Donahue, Pioneering Talk Show Host, Dies at 88 WWW.HOLLYWOODREPORTER.COM The 11-time Daytime Emmy winner presided over his program for 29 years and forged a path for Oprah Winfrey and others to follow. Quote Phil Donahue, the talk show innovator who changed the conversation and the course of daytime television with the weekday program he hosted for nearly three decades, has died. He was 88. Donahue died Sunday night surrounded by his family following a long illness, his family told the Today show. Survivors include his wife, That Girl star Marlo Thomas. They met when she was a guest on his show — he was a divorced single father living with and raising his four sons at the time — before marrying in May 1980. He is also survived by his sister, his children, grandchildren and his beloved golden retriever, Charlie. The Cleveland native hosted more than 6,000 iterations of The Phil Donahue Show, from the first, broadcast from a Dayton, Ohio station on Nov. 7, 1967, through the last, seen nationwide on syndication via Multimedia Entertainment, on Sept. 13, 1996. Donahue addressed contemporary and controversial topics and invited his studio audience to participate, carrying his microphone into the crowd. He became adept at interweaving their questions and remarks with his own running commentary. The issue-oriented approach was novel, and his topics — abortion, incest, artificial insemination, alcoholism, penile implants, homosexuality, same-sex couples raising children and priests’ pedophilia, to name just a few — proved cutting edge, making his show notorious and popular. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Best Posted August 19 Share Posted August 19 The most memorable thing from him for me was when he was on Bill O'Reilly's show and completely owned Bill. I really don't remember his show but RIP. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CitizenVectron Posted August 19 Share Posted August 19 I came into this thread being 50/50 on whether it was: Him being dead He sold the rights to his likeness to some AI company who will be running a 24/7 ai-generated version of his show forever Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SaysWho? Posted August 19 Share Posted August 19 An early critic of the Iraq War. Also a good interviewer. Look at this interview with Bernie Sanders in the 1990s. Also take note of "conservative Vermont." Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MarSolo Posted August 19 Share Posted August 19 Let’s not lionize the guy who showed up at the Oscars in 1994, threw up in a tuba, and then read the wrong movie when he opened the Best Picture envelope. Will Smith would never. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kal-El814 Posted August 20 Share Posted August 20 My favorite clip of him is that one where he basically tells Ayn Rand to eat shit. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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