Regis Philbin, a ubiquitous presence on American television since the mid-1960s, has died at age 88, according to PEOPLE. His cheery, unscripted morning chat show Live!, first with co-host Kathie Lee Gifford and then Kelly Ripa, ran nationally from 1988 to 2011.
“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,” his family said in a statement.
Born in the Bronx in 1931, Philbin attended the University of Notre Dame, whose “Fighting Irish” football team he championed for years from his morning pulpit on Live!.
After a stint in the Navy, Philbin began working in television, first as a writer, and then with a local morning show in San Diego. He achieved more prominence in 1967 as the sidekick on The Joey Bishop Show. In the 1970s he’d pop up from time to time in film and television (an episode of CHiPs, in Woody Allen’s Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About Sex But Were Afraid To Ask, in a small role in The Bad News Bears Go To Japan) but it was as himself where he mostly shined.
He bounced around to bigger markets as a talk show host, until he landed The Morning Show in New York on ABC. His original co-host in 1983 was Cyndy Garvy, who was replaced by Gifford (then Kathie Lee Crosby) in 1984. The local show, which was notable for its familiar tone and banter, later went national and changed its name.
On occasions when Regis’s co-host had to take the day off, his wife Joy Philbin would fill-in, adding to the “morning coffee with my television friends” vibe.
Regis’s warmth extended into appearances on other “hipper” shows of the late 1980s and 1990s. He always seemed overjoyed to have David Letterman or Howard Stern poke a little fun at the milder entertainer who led a program that might have fit in on 1930s radio.
In 1999, Philbin began hosting the wildly popular prime time game show Who Wants To Be A Millionaire? The show, a surprise hit, brought phrases like “final answer?” and “phone a friend” into common parlance. He hosted the show until 2002, and returned for additional stints in 2004 and 2009.
According to the Guinness Book of World Records, no one had “more hours on camera” than Philbin. There are 238 imdb credits for Regis Philbin under “Self.” You may have caught him one time on Rowan & Martin’s Laugh-In, or maybe it was Hee Haw, or possibly The Miss America Pageant, Walt Disney World’s Christmas Day Parade, or Snoop Dogg Presents ‘The Joker’s Wild’. Truth is, if you turned on the television at any point in the last 60 years, there was a solid chance he was there to welcome you.
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