Michael Delaney Dowd Jr. (August 11, 1920 - August 11, 2006), known as Mike Douglas , is American "Big Band" era singer, entertainer, television show host ( The Mike Douglas Show ), and the actor.
Video Mike Douglas
Early life and career
He started singing as a chorus. In his teenage years he worked as a singer on a dinner cruise on Lake Michigan. After serving in the United States Navy in World War II and as a "singing staff" for WMAQ-TV in Chicago, he moved to Los Angeles. He's on Ginny Simms radio show. After that, Douglas joined the big band Kay Kyser as a singer.
Though the big band swings faded from popularity as World War II ended, Kyser had to continue performing due to contractual obligations, and continued to log multiple hits with Douglas, including two famous hits, "Ole [or Old] Buttermilk Sky" in 1946 and "The Old Lamp-Lighter "the following year. Kyser was responsible for giving him the name of his show business, and he continued to perform with the band until Kyser retired in 1951 due to health problems. In 1950, he provided the voice of Prince Charming singing at Walt Disney Cinderella .
In the 1950s, Douglas, who lives in Burbank, California, tried to keep his career singing, working as a house singer for a nightclub and going out into the street to keep busy. In the middle of this decade, rock-and-roll and doo wop have taken over the charts, which left many old performers in musical trash. In the hardest years, Douglas and his wife survived by successfully "flipping" their Los Angeles homes.
Maps Mike Douglas
Talk show
Douglas next appeared in 1961 in Cleveland, where a colleague who had worked in Chicago hired him for $ 400 a week as a television talk show host at WKYC-TV, later known as KYW-TV. Mike Douglas Show quickly gained in popularity, and finally, a national syndication in August 1963 at five stations belonging to Westinghouse. The event was broadcast live on KYW-TV in his hometown, but this practice ended in 1965 after Zsa Zsa Gabor's guest used the phrase "bastard" while referring to Comedy comedy and Morey Amsterdam comedy of Dick Van Dyke Show .
As the owner of KYW-TV, Westinghouse Broadcasting, managed to have an exchange station with NBC reversed by the FCC, Westinghouse returned to Philadelphia on June 19, 1965 with a KYW summons, along with the station's swap coming The Mike Douglas Show , which broadcasting its first Philadelphia-based show on August 30, 1965. Even after ownership was returned to NBC, WKYC in Cleveland continued to run the program for many years thereafter. Guests ranging from Truman Capote and Richard Nixon to The Rolling Stones, Hermit and Kiss Herman, occasionally appear in front of the camera by Tim Conway (later found at WJW-TV, also in Cleveland). Moe Howard of "Three Stooges" fame was a guest several times, with a cake bout that must have happened at the end of the interview, and a platform speaker on nonverbal communication (body language). Cody Sweet.
The show helped introduce entertainers like Barbra Streisand and Aretha Franklin. After moving to Philadelphia, Douglas also attempted to revive his own singing career, recording his Top 40 single as a solo artist, "The Men In My Little Girl's Life" in 1966. In 1967, The Mike Douglas Show < i> broadcast to 171 markets and 6,000,000 viewers daily, mostly women at home. It generates $ 10.5 million annually from advertisers, while the host is paid more than $ 500,000. In 1967, the program received its first Emmy Award for Individual Achievement on Television Daylight from National Academy of Television Arts & amp; Science.
In July 1978, the talk show base was moved to Los Angeles, where it remained until it finally left the air in 1981. Near the end of its journey, the series switched to a mobile roadshow format and became The Mike Douglas Hours of Entertainment , but this change failed to improve the declining rank. After the series was canceled, Douglas hosted a celebrity-based CNN celebrity interview in Los Angeles, People Now , taking over hosting duties from Lee Leonard. He was replaced in January 1983 by the personality of WTBS, Bill Tush.
Other important achievements
Douglas became a local cultural icon in Philadelphia, often inviting leading players from the city's professional sports teams to be guests on his show (he has a special affinity for the city's pro football team, the Philadelphia Eagles, always referring to the team as "Our Eagles", and he often seen present in the Eagles game, especially when they appear on Monday Night Football ). He also helped in Frank Rizzo's mayor's campaign against the mocking jokes often told by outsiders about the city, acting as chief spokesman for the "Anti-Defamation Agency" that Rizzo had prepared for this purpose.
In February 1976, Hollywood acknowledged Douglas's contribution to television, honoring him with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame located on Hollywood Boulevard.
Douglas sang "The Star-Spangled Banner" before the first Philadelphia Phillies game at Veterans Stadium on April 10, 1971, and also sang the anthem before the Cincinnati Bengals-Miami Dolphins playoffs on December 23, 1973. He wrote two memoirs: My Story (1979) and I'll Be Right Back: Memories of the Great Talk Show TV (1999). He also wrote cookbooks, The Mike Douglas Cookbook (1969), featuring recipes from him, his family, and the event guests. 40 years after Douglas started his lecture at KYW-TV, his grandson Debbie Voinovich Donley designed the new successor to the WKYC broadcasting facility on Lakeside Avenue, completed in 2002. In 2007, a new documentary of Mike Douglas: Moments and Memories > i> is shown on the PBS station. Comedy Lily Tomlin The Incrible Shrinking Woman shows a diminishing Pat Kramer showing up at the Douglas show, where he sings "Little Things Mean a Lot" in his honor.
Death and inheritance
Douglas developed prostate cancer in 1990, but after surgery he was cancer-free and remained healthy until almost the end of his life. He died suddenly on August 11, 2006, his 86th birthday, at the Palm Beach Gardens Medical Center in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida. Although the exact cause of his death was not revealed, his widow, Genevieve, told the Associated Press that he was dehydrated while playing golf a few weeks earlier on a hot Florida summer day. Douglas was hospitalized after this episode, but he did not seem to be able to recover. Douglas also survived by his daughters Kelly and twin sisters Michele and Christine, as well as some grandchildren and great-grandchildren.
The Broadcast Pioneers of Philadelphia posthumously Douglas into their Hall of Fame in 2006.
Other television appearances
- 1969: Mike Douglas Christmas Specialties
- 1981: Greatest Hero of America ; guest appearance in premier two season
- 1982: Knots Landing ; episode: "Svengali"
- 1983: Love Boats as Marv Mason
See also
- Mike Douglas Show
References
External links
- Mike Douglas on IMDb
- Obituary, billboard.com; accessed August 9, 2015.
- WKYC-TV - Host Talk Show Mike Douglas remembers, wkyc.com; accessed August 9, 2015.
- Profile, cbs3.com; accessed August 9, 2015.
- Mike Douglas's interview video on Archive of American Television
Source of the article : Wikipedia
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