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Regis Philbin dead at 88


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Such a heartbreaking loss in the world of television.

 

I am so grateful to watch Regis during his tenures on Live and Who Wants to Be a Millionaire when I could when I was a kid. He was brilliantly witty and funny, superhumanly warm and genial and had the perfect talent to make anyone smile and entertained. Regis put on a clinic in television hosting every time he was on air, and I will never forget all that about him.

 

My condolences to his family.

May he Rest in Peace. 

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I knew him as "the guy who hosted Millionaire" as a kid, but I never knew he hosted a talk show at that same time until later in my childhood. This hits hard. RIP.

 

Coincidentally, Jeopardy is running the celebrity episode with him on Monday.

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1 hour ago, dabx said:

His first notable TV appearance was as an Ed McMahon type sidekick on the old Joey Bishop show in 1967 on ABC, competing with the The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson

 

But a few years prior, he tried to beat Johnny himself with the syndicated "That Regis Philbin Show"; it lasted only four months in 1964.

 

Reege's second attempt at a national show was "The Regis Philbin Show" on NBC daytime in 1981-82; it bombed as well (a handful of NBC affiliates didn't clear the show).

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I remember watching Regis as a little kid on WABC's The Morning Show. My mom watched it every morning. Then when my parents moved to the Tampa area in 1990 when I was 9, we tuned in to WTVT and there he and Kathie Lee where and I said "Wow! I didn't know they were on down here?" This was before I knew about syndicated TV. But that show always ran like it was still a local NYC show even in syndication. Regis was the ultimate entertainer. He is arguably up there with Dick Clark to me. His passing was the first celebrity passing that I felt in my heart in a long time. RIP Rege!

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4 hours ago, jerseyfla said:

But that show always ran like it was still a local NYC show even in syndication.


When Ryan Seacrest was being oriented to “Live”, Kelly Ripa described the show (and the relatively low budget operations behind it) as a local show that airs nationally. 
 

4 hours ago, jerseyfla said:

Regis was the ultimate entertainer. He is arguably up there with Dick Clark to me.


Agreed!  And ABC called upon Regis to host their annual New Year’s Eve show in 2004 after Dick Clark suffered a stroke a few weeks prior to the countdown to January 1. Ryan Seacrest would take over the following year, 12 years before becoming a co-host on the local show that Regis started. 
 

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Interesting that Kathie Lee Gifford spoke at length about Regis on NBC’s “Today” (her last stop before retiring) but was noticeably absent from this morning’s tribute to Regis on “Live”.  
 

Also odd about the “Live” tribute — they opted to go ahead with having their pre-schedules guests appear (Kiefer Sutherland and a chef) who spoke about Regis while also plugging their new shows and cooking.  The first half hour was a nice tribute to Regis from Kelly, Ryan, Gelman and Art Moore ... but kind of fell flat and honestly appeared a bit fake at times, perhaps because it was. 
 

They also opted to remain at home and on Skype. Considering WABC and Good Morning America are back in their studios, I’d think Kelly and Ryan could pull it together to be in the studio at least for this morning to do a proper show for Regis. I understand the pandemic going and staffing issues, but c’mon...
 

ABC is airing a primetime tribute to him Tuesday at 8pm. Hopefully that is done better than what “Live” attempted this morning. 

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Consider me part of the camp who genuinely dislikes Ripa but with that said, we are in the middle of a pandemic with a lot of health and financial impacts. Is it possible that an elaborate in-studio tribute would have required the support of employees who are in furloughs or laid off at the moment?


This isn’t an excuse but isn’t it largely believed that Regis and Kelly had a cold relationship towards the end of his run and even more after his departure in 2011? I seem to remember him responding to a question about their relationship in a somewhat negative way. He seemed at times to visibly display how little he thought of her (for reasons I agree with entirely).
 

Nonetheless, I do think a stronger tribute sometime down the line will be appropriate for the man who literally built the show.

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#LEGEND

 

So awesome to see someone who was well respected by everyone. Loved him on "Live" and "Millionaire" and everything else that he was a part of.  He was really genuine, self-deprecating and had a very dynamic personality. I'll miss his storytelling and presenting. 

 

 

 

 

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4 hours ago, MorningNews said:

Consider me part of the camp who genuinely dislikes Ripa but with that said, we are in the middle of a pandemic with a lot of health and financial impacts. Is it possible that an elaborate in-studio tribute would have required the support of employees who are in furloughs or laid off at the moment?


This isn’t an excuse but isn’t it largely believed that Regis and Kelly had a cold relationship towards the end of his run and even more after his departure in 2011? I seem to remember him responding to a question about their relationship in a somewhat negative way. He seemed at times to visibly display how little he thought of her (for reasons I agree with entirely).
 

Nonetheless, I do think a stronger tribute sometime down the line will be appropriate for the man who literally built the show.

 

I don't think an in studio set up would require much more than Kelly, Ryan, Gelman and a camera operator. The rest of the staff can still work remotely and the essential studio operations are staffed by people who are already performing other duties for WABC-TV. Perhaps use of the studio is still something they have no control over until Disney/ABC gives the okay.

 

Their relationship certainly did turn cold after his departure for unknown reasons. Regis claimed that he was never asked back to the show and had not spoken to or seen Ripa since he left. That, of course, was not true since he appeared in the Halloween special in 2015 (alongside Kathie Lee Gifford) and they published video of him and Ripa reuniting behind the scenes getting ready for the show. WABC-TV also stated that Regis was invited back several times and ultimately canceled the one date that they did confirm. I do think Regis was bitter about leaving. He reportedly felt pushed out by ABC - they offered him a new contract with a salary cut which led to him feeling it was not worth it to keep going. So, who knows what actually happed to sour the relationship but it was unfortunate to see that happen.

 

I agree that a stronger tribute in the future, once they are in person again, is appropriate but I doubt that will happen. It seems like the ABC network special - which is being produced by the 20/20 team - will do what Live should have done. Here is an excerpt from the press release:

 

The special edition of "20/20" features an exclusive interview with "Live with Kelly and Ryan" host Kelly Ripa, Philbin's former co-host for a decade. The program will also include Philbin's final television interview with Jimmy Kimmel in March 2020, as well as interviews with his co-hosts through the years including Kathie Lee Gifford and Mary Hart; interviews with his childhood friends; a tour of the Bronx where he grew up; an emotional surprise visit with students at his high school; and a trip down memory lane with Philbin screening some of his favorite clips of "Live." 

 

"Regis Philbin: The Morning Maestro - A Special Edition of 20/20" airs Tuesday, July 28 (8:00 - 9:00 p.m. EDT), on ABC. 

 

 

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There are so many priceless Regis moments (he was on television for decades after all), but here's one that I think this crowd will like.

 

 

Also on a related note, this was and is my favorite Shelley Palmer creation.

 

 

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The ABC primetime special was well edited and scripted, but the only new content was a short interview with Kelly Ripa. Nearly everything else was pulled from an old Katie Couric special that ABC aired the night prior to Regis’ last day hosting “Live” and from Regis’ recent visit to Jimmy Kimmel’s “Millionaire” set.
 

 

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On 7/25/2020 at 11:50 PM, johnnya2k6 said:

But a few years prior, he tried to beat Johnny himself with the syndicated "That Regis Philbin Show"; it lasted only four months in 1964.

 

Reege's second attempt at a national show was "The Regis Philbin Show" on NBC daytime in 1981-82; it bombed as well (a handful of NBC affiliates didn't clear the show).

Was it really necessary to list his failures? Can the man be in the dirt for 5 minutes jeez

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21 hours ago, JustinH said:

Was it really necessary to list his failures? Can the man be in the dirt for 5 minutes jeez

Well, Regis already had two strikes against him in attempting to make a name for himself, but finally hit a home run when The Morning Show caught the attention of Disney executives, who wanted to take the show national through its then-syndication arm Buena Vista Television. The rest, as they say, is history.

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Mentioning a successful person's missteps and failures is all a part of their story. Without the cancellation of Joey Bishop's show or the quickly-canned other shows, he wouldn't have risen to the great heights he achieved. Finding his widest audience and greatest success past the age of 60 is an inspiration for anyone in show business. No need to dwell on the failures, sure, he'd be the first to admit they were important parts of his life and career.

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I ended up watching much of his interview that he did with the Television Academy, and he talked a fair amount about his early attempts and failures on national television. Here's a part of the interview where he talks about his success at taking his show to WABC and then insisting on wanting to syndicate it despite the station's objections. He said he wanted one last shot at trying to get a national talk show off the ground. Nevermind the fact that he was already approaching 60 years old by that point and didn't have too much luck on national TV beforehand. I guess it's one of those cases of everything happening for a reason.

 

 

If you want to watch the whole thing, it's here. It's also annotated, so you can jump to other parts of it, including portions where he talked more about the Joey Bishop Show and his shows prior to WABC. There are plenty of interesting things in here, including where he talks about Millionaire. He actually wanted to do Millionaire so much that he talked the network into giving the job to him even though he wasn't on their shortlist for potential hosts.

 

https://interviews.televisionacademy.com/interviews/regis-philbin#interview-clips

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2 hours ago, C Block said:

 

If you want to watch the whole thing, it's here. It's also annotated, so you can jump to other parts of it, including portions where he talked more about the Joey Bishop Show and his shows prior to WABC. There are plenty of interesting things in here, including where he talks about Millionaire. He actually wanted to do Millionaire so much that he talked the network into giving the job to him even though he wasn't on their shortlist for potential hosts.

 

https://interviews.televisionacademy.com/interviews/regis-philbin#interview-clips

 

 

Thank you for sharing that link! I just watched through several parts - really fascinating! What's interesting is that at the time the interview was conducted on Nov. 1, 2006, he said he was getting tired and would probably retire in 2 1/2 years when his contract was up. That would put his retirement timeline sometime in 2009. Clearly, ABC got him to stay a few more years and he retired in 2011... this seems to put to rest any rumors that he was forced out by ABC.

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