Though Minow remained in the FCC post just two years, he left a permanent stamp on the broadcasting industry through government steps to foster satellite communications, the passage of a law mandating UHF reception on TV sets and his outspoken advocacy for quality in television. He was 97.
LOUIS (AP) — Mike Shannon, a two-time World Series winner and longtime St. Louis Cardinals broadcaster, has died. He was 83. The Cardinals said he died Saturday night in St. […]
Jerry Springer, the onetime mayor and news anchor whose namesake TV show featured a three-ring circus of dysfunctional families willing to bare all on weekday afternoons including brawls, obscenities and blurred images of nudity, died Thursday. At its peak, The Jerry Springer Show was a ratings powerhouse and a U.S. cultural pariah, synonymous with lurid drama. Known for chair-throwing and bleep-filled arguments, the daytime talk show was a favorite American guilty pleasure over its 27-year run, at one point topping Oprah Winfrey’s show.
Exclusives
CONCORD, N.H. (AP) — Mike Pride, who cultivated excellence in journalism as a New Hampshire newspaper editor and later rewarded it as administrator of the Pulitzer Prizes, has died. He […]
With his glowing, handsome face and silky-husky voice, Belafonte was one of the first Black performers to gain a wide following on film and to sell a million records as a singer. Belafonte had been a major artist since the 1950s. He won a Tony Award in 1954 for his starring role in John Murray Anderson’s Almanac and five years later became the first Black performer to win an Emmy for the CBS special Tonight with Belafonte. He was 96.
LOS ANGELES (AP) — Ginnie Newhart, who was married to comedy legend Bob Newhart for six decades and inspired the classic ending of his “Newhart” series, has died. She was […]
LONDON (AP) — Len Goodman, the urbane, long-serving judge on “Dancing with the Stars” and “Strictly Come Dancing,” has died, his agent said Monday. He was 78. Agent Jackie Gill […]
CANBERRA, Australia (AP) — Tony Award-winning comedian Barry Humphries, internationally renowned for his garish stage persona Dame Edna Everage, a condescending and imperfectly-veiled snob whose evolving character has delighted audiences […]
Herb Lazarus, a veteran international TV distribution executive who worked for 20th Century Fox and Columbia Pictures TV before launching his own shingle, died April 18 in Los Angeles. All told, Lazarus worked in the entertainment industry for more than 65 years, across 13 different companies. (Courtesy of Lazarus family)
Piano-playing comedian and political satirist Mark Russell died on Thursday, March 30. For more than 50 years, Russell took shots at all sectors of the political spectrum with stand-up monologues and song parodies. He was best known for his PBS specials, which he taped six times a year from 1975 to 2004. His routines, which he sang and performed on piano, covered the latest political news with timely lyrical updates of classic songs. He was 90. (Photo courtesy of Gary Hahn)
LONDON (AP) — Entertainer Paul O’Grady, who achieved fame as drag queen Lily Savage before becoming a much-loved comedian and host on British television, has died. He was 67. Britain’s […]
Royal Blakeman, a president of the National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences in the 1960s, died Sunday in Delray Beach, Fla. He was 99. Blakeman served as president of the New York chapter of NATAS from 1963-65 and then as the seventh national president of the organization from 1966 to 1968. For a quarter-century, he was general counsel at the Recording Academy, which in 2003 presented him with its Trustees Award.
MEXICO CITY (AP) — Xavier López, a Mexican children’s comic better known by his stage name “Chabelo,” has died at 88, President Andrés Manuel López Obrador wrote Saturday. López’s best-known […]
