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Kathie Lee Gifford
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Kathryn Lee "Kathie Lee" Gifford (born Kathryn Lee Epstein; August 16, 1953) is an American television hostess, singer, actor, noted for her 15-year run (1985–2000) on the talk show Live with Regis and Kathie Lee, which she co-hosted with Regis Philbin. She has received 11 Emmy nominations. Before her long stint in talk shows, Gifford's first television exposure was that of Tom Kennedy's singer/sidekick on Name That Tune, from 1974 to 1978.
On April 7, 2008, Gifford started co-hosting the fourth hour of NBC's Today Show with Hoda Kotb.
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Kathryn Lee "Kathie Lee" Gifford (born Kathryn Lee Epstein; August 16, 1953) is an American television hostess, singer, actor, noted for her 15-year run (1985–2000) on the talk show Live with Regis and Kathie Lee, which she co-hosted with Regis Philbin. She has received 11 Emmy nominations. Before her long stint in talk shows, Gifford's first television exposure was that of Tom Kennedy's singer/sidekick on Name That Tune, from 1974 to 1978.
On April 7, 2008, Gifford started co-hosting the fourth hour of NBC's Today Show with Hoda Kotb. They replaced Ann Curry and Natalie Morales. The show's ratings increased by 14 points within the first two months of Gifford's arrival.
Early life
Gifford was born in Paris, France, the daughter of Joan (née Cuttell), a singer, and Aaron Epstein, a musician and U.S. naval officer stationed in France at the time. She grew up in Bowie, Maryland, attended Bowie High School and was a singer in a folk group, Pennsylvania Next Right, which performed frequently at school assemblies. Gifford attended Kansas State University in Manhattan, Kansas, studying drama and music.
Her paternal grandfather was Jewish and her mother was a Methodist; Gifford grew up in a culturally Jewish environment, but she became a born-again Christian at the age of 12 (after seeing a The Restless Ones, a Christian education film directed by Billy Graham), and told interviewer Larry King, "I was raised with many Jewish traditions and raised to be very grateful for my Jewish heritage." Her brother, Rev. David Paul Epstein, is an evangelical Baptist preacher and pastor of Calvary Baptist Church on West 57th Street in Manhattan, New York City.
She has two children, Cody, 18 and Cassidy, 15.
1970s
During one summer in the early 1970s she was a live-in secretary/babysitter for Anita Bryant at her home in Miami. Gifford's career took off in the 1970s (during her first marriage to Christian composer/arranger/producer/publisher Paul Johnson) as a vocalist on the game show Name That Tune with Tom Kennedy (she performed the "sing a tune" segment as Kathie Lee Johnson). In 1978, she joined the cast of the short-lived Hee Haw sitcom spinoff, Hee Haw Honeys.
Gifford appeared in television advertisements for Carnival Cruise Lines beginning in 1984. The ads were the first cruise line ads to air on network television.
Live with Regis and Kathie Lee
Following her divorce from Johnson in 1983, Gifford met sports commentator Frank Gifford during an episode of ABC's Good Morning America; the couple married in 1986. Coincidentally, they share the same birthday, 23 years apart.
By that time, she was several months into her most famous television role, as a full-time morning talk show personality. On June 24, 1985, she replaced Ann Abernathy as co-host of The Morning Show on WABC-TV with Regis Philbin. The program went into national broadcast in 1988, as Live with Regis and Kathie Lee and Gifford became well-known across the country. Throughout the 1990s, millions of morning-TV viewers watched her descriptions of life at home with her sportscaster husband and their two children: son Cody Newton Gifford (born in 1990) and Cassidy Erin Gifford (born in 1993). She appeared as a spokesperson for Slim Fast diet shakes after Cody was born.
Gifford was inspired to name her son Cody after watching her husband on a Monday Night Football game in 1989 featuring the Cleveland Browns and Chicago Bears. Cody Risien was an offensive lineman for the Browns and got much attention during the course of the contest because he was struggling with removing a piece of dirt from his eye that forced him to the sideline. The announcers kept on panning the camera over to Risien, making the name "Cody" instantly memorable for her.
Countering international sweat shop abuse
In 1996, the National Labor Committee, a human rights group, reported that sweatshop labor was used to make clothes for the Kathie Lee line, sold at Wal-Mart. The group reported that a worker in Honduras smuggled a piece of clothing out of the factory, which had a Kathie Lee label on it. One of the workers, Wendy Diaz, came to the United States to testify about the conditions under which she worked. She commented that "I wish I could talk to [Kathie Lee]. If she's good, she will help us."
Labor activist Charles Kernaghan spoke to the media and accused Gifford of being responsible for the sweat shop management activity. Gifford addressed Kernaghan's allegations on the air during Live, explaining that she was not involved with hands-on project management in factories. Gifford subsequently contacted Federal authorities to investigate the issue, and worked with U.S. Federal legislative and executive branch agencies to support and enact laws to protect children against sweat shop conditions. She appeared with President Bill Clinton at the White House in support of the government's initiatives to counter international sweat shop abuses. (Years later, on April 13, 2007, in an unrelated appearance at the National Press Club, Gifford, in answer to questions, stated that Kernaghan had called her three months after his first public allegations against her and apologized.)
Later career
Since Live, Gifford has made guest appearances in films and television series, and has several independently released albums on CD, including 2000's The Heart of a Woman, featuring the single "Love Never Fails".
In September 2005 she became a special correspondent on The Insider, a syndicated entertainment magazine television show, although she no longer appears regularly.
Gifford appeared as Miss Hannigan in a concert performance of Annie at Madison Square Garden in December 2006.
In February 2007 Gifford was attending a CD-signing event at a shopping mall in Paramus, New Jersey. During this event Gifford was attacked by Joey Boots, a member of The Wack Pack from the Howard Stern Show. After signing Boots' CD, Boots removed a box from a shopping bag, threw it at Gifford, from which two dozen white mice emerged. Boots was evicted from the mall, and Gifford was unhurt.
She is a celebrity ambassador for the non-profit organization Childhelp. She regularly makes appearances at fund raisers and events for the child abuse prevention and treatment organization and is an ardent supporter.
Gifford and her husband raised the money to build and continue to financially support two shelters in New York City for babies born with HIV or a congenital crack cocaine addiction. These shelters were named in honor of her children, Cody and Cassidy.
On March 31 2008, NBC announced that Gifford was to join its morning show, Today, as co-host of the fourth hour, alongside Hoda Kotb. This marked her return to morning television; in many markets, she now airs directly after her old show, now called Live with Regis and Kelly. Because the 4th hour of Today airs live at 10:00am EST, and Live with Regis and Kelly airs live at 9:00am EST, Gifford's hour will not compete directly with her former show in most markets.
On 1 July, 2008, Gifford appeared on NBC’s Celebrity Family Feud. She and her friends and family competed against the cast of Dog The Bounty Hunter for their favorite charity. Gifford's family won the $50,000 for The Association to Benefit Children.
She is a recipient of the "Mousecar" Award (as in "Oscar"), a silver Mickey Mouse statue award that was personally designed by Walt Disney himself. The award was presented personally by Disney CEO Michael Eisner who said that only five had been given out previously.
Playwright
In the late 1990s, Gifford began working in musical theatre as a playwright. She contributed a number of musical numbers to Hats, and wrote and produced Under The Bridge , based upon the children's book The Family Under The Bridge by Natalie Savage Carlson.
In 2007, she premiered Saving Aimee, a play about evangelist Aimee McPherson, at the Signature Theatre in Arlington, Virginia . The premiere stars Tony-nominated actress Carolee Carmello in the lead role .
On April 16, 2007, Gifford was a guest presenter at the Washington, DC Helen Hayes Award Ceremony, honoring contributions and professional accomplishments in theatre.
Pop Culture
In the South Park Episode Weight Gain 4000, Mr. Garrison attempts to assassinate Kathie Lee Gifford for beating him in a talent show when they were kids.
On Murphy Brown, the character of Dottie Wilcox is based on Kathie Lee Gifford. Wilcox, portrayed by Shelley Long on two episodes, is an obnoxious talk-show host, half of a morning-show duo. On the second episode "Son of Dottie" a scandal is discovered about her clothing line, similar to the one Gifford was involved in.
In the episode of Married... with Children titled 'Children of the Corns' (Season 11, Episode 2. No. 237, aired October 5, 1996), Gifford's on-air speech following the child labor scandal was referenced. After being exposed as having hired child labour to manufacture her store's shoes, Al's boss Gary (Janet Carroll), says "You can say I'm ugly. You can say I'm untalented. But don't you dare say I don't care about the children!"
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