Phillip John "Phil" Donahue (born December 21, 1935) is an American media personality,
writerA writer is a person who produces literature, such as novels, short stories, plays, screenplays, poetry, or other literary art. Skilled writers are able to use language to portray ideas and images....
, and
film producerA film producer oversees and delivers a film project to all relevant parties while preserving the integrity, voice and vision of the film. They will also often take on some financial risk by using their own money, especially during the pre-production period, before a film is fully financed.The...
best known as the creator and host of
The Phil Donahue ShowThe Phil Donahue Show, also known as Donahue, is an American television talk show that ran for 26 years on national television. Its run was preceded by three years of local broadcast in Dayton, Ohio, and it was broadcast nationwide between 1967 and 1996.In 2002, Donahue was ranked #29 on TV Guide's...
. The television program, also known as
Donahue, was the first to use a talk show format. The show had a 26-year run on U.S. national TV, preceded by three years of local broadcast in
Dayton, OhioDayton is the 6th largest city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Montgomery County, the fifth most populous county in the state. The population was 141,527 at the 2010 census. The Dayton Metropolitan Statistical Area had a population of 841,502 in the 2010 census...
, before ending in 1996.
His shows have often focused on issues that often divide liberals and
conservativesConservatism in the United States has played an important role in American politics since the 1950s. Historian Gregory Schneider identifies several constants in American conservatism: respect for tradition, support of republicanism, preservation of "the rule of law and the Christian religion", and...
in the United States, such as
abortionAbortion is defined as the termination of pregnancy by the removal or expulsion from the uterus of a fetus or embryo prior to viability. An abortion can occur spontaneously, in which case it is usually called a miscarriage, or it can be purposely induced...
, consumer protection,
civil rightsCivil and political rights are a class of rights that protect individuals' freedom from unwarranted infringement by governments and private organizations, and ensure one's ability to participate in the civil and political life of the state without discrimination or repression.Civil rights include...
and war issues. His most frequent guest was
Ralph NaderRalph Nader is an American political activist, as well as an author, lecturer, and attorney. Areas of particular concern to Nader include consumer protection, humanitarianism, environmentalism, and democratic government....
, for whom Donahue campaigned in
2000The United States presidential election of 2000 was a contest between Republican candidate George W. Bush, then-governor of Texas and son of former president George H. W. Bush , and Democratic candidate Al Gore, then-Vice President....
. Donahue also hosted a talk show on
MSNBCMSNBC is a cable news channel based in the United States available in the US, Germany , South Africa, the Middle East and Canada...
from 2002–2003.
In 1996, Donahue was ranked #42 on TV Guide's 50 Greatest TV Stars of All Time.
Early life
Donahue was born into a middle-class,
churchgoingIn spiritual terminology, piety is a virtue that can mean religious devotion, spirituality, or a combination of both. A common element in most conceptions of piety is humility.- Etymology :...
,
Irish CatholicIrish Catholic is a term used to describe people who are both Roman Catholic and Irish .Note: the term is not used to describe a variant of Catholicism. More particularly, it is not a separate creed or sect in the sense that "Anglo-Catholic", "Old Catholic", "Eastern Orthodox Catholic" might be...
family in
Cleveland, OhioCleveland is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and is the county seat of Cuyahoga County, the most populous county in the state. The city is located in northeastern Ohio on the southern shore of Lake Erie, approximately west of the Pennsylvania border...
; his father was a
furnitureFurniture is the mass noun for the movable objects intended to support various human activities such as seating and sleeping in beds, to hold objects at a convenient height for work using horizontal surfaces above the ground, or to store things...
sales clerk and his mother a department store
shoeA shoe is an item of footwear intended to protect and comfort the human foot while doing various activities. Shoes are also used as an item of decoration. The design of shoes has varied enormously through time and from culture to culture, with appearance originally being tied to function...
clerk. In 1949, he graduated from of Our Lady Of Angels
elementary schoolAn elementary school or primary school is an institution where children receive the first stage of compulsory education known as elementary or primary education. Elementary school is the preferred term in some countries, particularly those in North America, where the terms grade school and grammar...
in the
West ParkKamm's Corners is a neighborhood on the west side of Cleveland, Ohio. It is roughly bounded by the Rocky River on the west, I-90 and the city of Lakewood to the north, the New York Central Railroad tracks Kamm's Corners is a neighborhood on the west side of Cleveland, Ohio. It is roughly bounded by...
neighborhood. In 1953, Donahue was a member of the first graduating class of
St. Edward High SchoolSt. Edward High School is private, all-male Catholic, college-preparatory high school located in Lakewood, Ohio, a western Cleveland suburb. It was founded in 1949 and is operated in the by the Midwest Province of the Brothers of Holy Cross, Notre Dame, Indiana. It is one of three remaining...
, an all-boys college prep Catholic private high school run by the
Congregation of Holy CrossThe Congregation of Holy Cross or Congregatio a Sancta Cruce is a Catholic congregation of priests and brothers founded in 1837 by Blessed Father Basil Anthony-Marie Moreau, CSC, in Le Mans, France....
in suburban
Lakewood, OhioLakewood is a city in Cuyahoga County, Ohio, United States. It is part of the Greater Cleveland Metropolitan Area, and borders the city of Cleveland. The population was 52,131 at the 2010 making it the third largest city in Cuyahoga County, behind Cleveland and Parma .Lakewood, one of Cleveland's...
. He graduated from the
University of Notre DameThe University of Notre Dame du Lac is a Catholic research university located in Notre Dame, an unincorporated community north of the city of South Bend, in St. Joseph County, Indiana, United States...
, which is also run by the Congregation of Holy Cross, with a
B.B.AThe Bachelor of Business Administration is a bachelor's degree in Commerce and business administration. In most universities, the degree is conferred upon a student after four years of full-time study in one or more areas of business concentrations; see below...
in 1957.
Career
Donahue began his career in 1957 as a production assistant at
KYW radioWTAM — branded Newsradio WTAM 1100 — is a commercial radio station licensed to Cleveland, Ohio, serving Greater Cleveland and much of surrounding Northeast Ohio. Owned by Clear Channel Communications, the station broadcasts primarily a news/talk format...
and
televisionWKYC, virtual channel 3 , is an NBC-affiliated television station located in Cleveland, Ohio, owned by the Gannett Company. Its studio is located on the shores of Lake Erie, while its transmitter is located in Parma, Ohio....
in Cleveland. He got a chance to become an announcer one day when the regular announcer failed to show up. After a brief stint as a bank check sorter in
Albuquerque, New MexicoAlbuquerque is the largest city in the state of New Mexico, United States. It is the county seat of Bernalillo County and is situated in the central part of the state, straddling the Rio Grande. The city population was 545,852 as of the 2010 Census and ranks as the 32nd-largest city in the U.S. As...
, he became program director for WABJ radio in
Adrian, MichiganAs of the 2010 census Adrian had a population of 21,133. The racial and ethnic makeup of the population was 84.1% white, 4.4% black or African American, 0.6% Native American, 0.9% Asian, 5.9% from some other race and 4.0% from two or more races...
, soon after graduating. He moved on to become a
stringerIn journalism, a stringer is a type of freelance journalist or photographer who contributes reports or photos to a news organization on an ongoing basis but is paid individually for each piece of published or broadcast work....
for the
CBS Evening NewsCBS Evening News is the flagship nightly television news program of the American television network CBS. The network has broadcast this program since 1948, and has used the CBS Evening News title since 1963....
and later, an anchor of the morning newscast at
WHIO-TVWHIO-TV, virtual channel 7, is the CBS-affiliated television station licensed to Dayton, Ohio, serving that state's Miami Valley area. It broadcasts a high definition digital signal on UHF channel 41 from its transmitter on Germantown Street in western Dayton....
in
Dayton, OhioDayton is the 6th largest city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Montgomery County, the fifth most populous county in the state. The population was 141,527 at the 2010 census. The Dayton Metropolitan Statistical Area had a population of 841,502 in the 2010 census...
, where his interviews with
Jimmy HoffaJames Riddle "Jimmy" Hoffa was an American labor union leader....
and
Billie Sol EstesBillie Sol Estes is an American former financier best known for his association with U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson. Mr. Estes currently lives in Granbury, Texas.-Fraud charges:...
were picked up nationally. While in Dayton, Donahue also hosted
Conversation Piece, a phone-in afternoon talk show from 1963 to 1967 on
WHIO radioWHIO is a radio station broadcasting a News Talk Information format. Licensed to Dayton, Ohio, USA, the station serves the Cincinnati and Dayton area...
. There, among others, he interviewed civil rights activists (including Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.,
Malcolm XMalcolm X , born Malcolm Little and also known as El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz , was an African American Muslim minister and human rights activist. To his admirers he was a courageous advocate for the rights of African Americans, a man who indicted white America in the harshest terms for its...
) and war dissenters.
The Phil Donahue Show
On November 6, 1967, Donahue left WHIO, moving his talk program to television with
The Phil Donahue Show on WLWD (now
WDTNWDTN, virtual channel 2, is the NBC-affiliated television station for Ohio's Miami Valley. Licensed to Dayton, it broadcasts a high definition digital signal on UHF channel 50 from a transmitter in the Frytown section of the city. The station can also be seen on Time Warner Cable channel 2 and in...
), also in Dayton. Initially, the program was shown only on other stations owned by the
Crosley Broadcasting CorporationThe Crosley Broadcasting Corporation was a radio and television broadcaster founded by radio manufacturing pioneer Powel Crosley, Jr.. The company was an early operator of radio stations in the United States. Based in Cincinnati, Ohio, Crosley's flagship station was WLW...
(which would later take the name of its parent
Avco CompanyAvco Corporation is a subsidiary of Textron which operates Textron Systems Corporation and Lycoming.-Brief history:The Embry-Riddle Company created the Aviation Corporation in 1928 as a holding company tasked with acquiring small airlines...
), which also owned WLWD. But, in January 1970,
The Phil Donahue Show entered nationwide
syndicationIn broadcasting, syndication is the sale of the right to broadcast radio shows and television shows by multiple radio stations and television stations, without going through a broadcast network, though the process of syndication may conjure up structures like those of a network itself, by its very...
. Donahue's syndicated show was originally taped in Chicago where he worked and lived: then in 1984, he moved the show to New York City where he had both celebrities and controversial figureheads share the studio. The move to New York City also helped him to be near his Connecticut home and wife
Marlo ThomasMargaret Julia “Marlo” Thomas is an American actress, producer, and social activist known for her starring role on the TV series That Girl . She also serves as National Outreach Director for St. Jude Children's Research Hospital...
.
After a 29-year run—-26 years in syndication—-and nearly 7,000 one-hour daily shows, the final original episode of
Donahue aired in May 1996, culminating what remains the longest continuous run of any syndicated talk show in U.S. television history.
While hosting his own program, Donahue also appeared on
NBCThe National Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network and former radio network headquartered in the GE Building in New York City's Rockefeller Center with additional major offices near Los Angeles and in Chicago...
's
The Today Show as a contributor, from 1980 until 1982. From 1991 to 1994 he also co-hosted
Pozner/Donahue, a weekly, issues-oriented roundtable program with
SovietThe Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....
journalist
Vladimir PoznerVladimir Vladimirovich Posner , born 1 April 1934, is a Russian journalist best known in the West for appearing on television to represent and explain the views of the Soviet Union during the Cold War...
, which aired both on
CNBCCNBC is a satellite and cable television business news channel in the U.S., owned and operated by NBCUniversal. The network and its international spinoffs cover business headlines and provide live coverage of financial markets. The combined reach of CNBC and its siblings is 390 million viewers...
and in syndication.
MSNBC program
In July 2002, Phil Donahue returned to television to host a show called
Donahue on
MSNBCMSNBC is a cable news channel based in the United States available in the US, Germany , South Africa, the Middle East and Canada...
. On February 25, 2003, MSNBC canceled the show, citing low viewership. According to the
New York Times despite being heavily promoted by MSNBC and having a debuting audience of 660,000 only three weeks into the show, viewership had fallen to 390,000 viewers. By the end of 2002, Donahue’s audience was down to 379,000. Although his ratings were less than 1/6
Bill O'ReillyWilliam James "Bill" O'Reilly, Jr. is an American television host, author, syndicated columnist and political commentator. He is the host of the political commentary program The O'Reilly Factor on the Fox News Channel, which is the most watched cable news television program on American television...
, whose
The O'Reilly FactorThe O'Reilly Factor, originally titled The O'Reilly Report from 1996 to 1998 and often called The Factor, is an American talk show on the Fox News Channel hosted by commentator Bill O'Reilly, who often discusses current controversial political issues with guests.The program was the most watched...
shared the same time slot, Donahue was the highest rated show on MSNBC at the time it was canceled, managing to beat out
Chris MatthewsChristopher John "Chris" Matthews is an American news anchor and political commentator, known for his nightly hour-long talk show, Hardball with Chris Matthews, which is televised on the American cable television channel MSNBC...
' "Hardball" in the ratings. Soon after the show's cancellation AllYourTV.com reported it had received a copy of an internal NBC memo that stated Donahue should be fired because he would be a "difficult public face for NBC in a time of war". In 2005
Norman SolomonNorman Solomon is an American journalist, media critic, antiwar activist, and current candidate for the United States House of Representatives. Solomon is a longtime associate of the media watch group Fairness & Accuracy In Reporting...
's book
Made Love, Got War: Close Encounters with America's Warfare State came to the same conclusion.
Film producer
In 2007, Donahue served as Executive Producer for the feature documentary film,
Body of WarBody of War, directed by Ellen Spiro and Phil Donahue, is a 2007 documentary following Tomas Young, an Iraq War veteran paralyzed from a bullet to the spine, on a physical and emotional journey as he adapts to his new body and begins to question the decision to go to war in Iraq.As Tomas's journey...
, which he also co-directed with independent filmmaker
Ellen SpiroEllen Spiro is an American documentary filmmaker. Spiro is known for making humorous social issue films for national and international television broadcasts and theatrical release....
. The film tells the story of Tomas Young, a severely disabled Iraq War veteran and his turbulent postwar adjustments. In November 2007 the film was named as one of fifteen documentaries to be in consideration for an Oscar nomination from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.
Honors
Donahue was awarded nine Emmy Awards during his broadcasting career, and was inducted into the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences Hall of Fame on November 20, 1993.
Personal life
In 1958, he married his first wife, Marge Cooney, who divorced him in 1975. There were five children from that marriage. He married his second (and present) wife, actress
Marlo ThomasMargaret Julia “Marlo” Thomas is an American actress, producer, and social activist known for her starring role on the TV series That Girl . She also serves as National Outreach Director for St. Jude Children's Research Hospital...
(daughter of
Danny ThomasDanny Thomas was an American nightclub comedian and television and film actor, best known for starring in the television sitcom Make Room for Daddy . He was also the founder of St. Jude Children's Research Hospital...
), in 1980. They have lived in
Westport, Connecticut-Neighborhoods:* Saugatuck – around the Westport railroad station near the southwestern corner of the town – a built-up area with some restaurants, stores and offices....
since 1986.
Donahue does not see himself as "a very good Roman Catholic," given that he did not want to have his first marriage
annulledIn the Roman Catholic Church an annulment is the procedure, governed by the Church's Canon Law and the Catechism, whereby an ecclesial tribunal determines the sacrament of marriage was invalidly entered into. An annulment determines the Catholic marriage to be void at its inception...
. He has elaborated that he "will always be a Catholic" but that he opposes what he sees as the Church's "
antisexual theologyIn Roman Catholicism, the Theology of the Body is based on the premise that the human body has its origin in God. It will be, like the body of Jesus, Resurrected, transformed and taken into heavenly glory. Theological anthropology is based on this premise...
." He has also said that he found
Madalyn Murray O'HairMadalyn Murray O'Hair was an American atheist activist and founder of the organization American Atheists and its president from 1963 to 1986. One of her sons, Jon Garth Murray, was the president of the organization from 1986 to 1995, while she remained de facto president during these nine years....
's message of
atheismAtheism is, in a broad sense, the rejection of belief in the existence of deities. In a narrower sense, atheism is specifically the position that there are no deities...
"very important." He has admitted that he is not permitted to receive the Blessed Sacrament, since the Church sees him as living in a state of adultery.
On November 10, 2010, Oprah Winfrey invited Donahue, along with former talk show hosts
Sally Jessy RaphaelSally Lowenthal , better known as Sally Jessy Raphael, is an American talk show host, known for the eponymous Sally talk show she hosted for two decades.-Early years:...
,
Geraldo RiveraGeraldo Rivera is an American attorney, journalist, author, reporter, and former talk show host...
,
Ricki LakeRicki Pamela Lake is an American actress, producer, and television host. She is best known for her starring role as Tracy Turnblad in the original Hairspray, her ground-breaking documentary film The Business of Being Born, and her talk show which was broadcasted internationally from...
and
Montel WilliamsMontel Brian Anthony Williams is an American television personality, radio talk show host and actor. He is best known as host of the long-running The Montel Williams Show, and more recently as a spokesperson for the Partnership for Prescription Assistance...
as guests on her show. This was the first time that she had fellow talkers appear together since their programs left the air.
External links