Sonny Fox
Encyclopedia
Irwin "Sonny" Fox is an American television
host, executive and broadcasting consultant, who was the fourth full-time host of the children's television program, Wonderama
.
veteran, Fox's first experience in children's programming came in 1954, with a St. Louis
program, The Finder on KETC
-TV, a children's news and travelogue program. His first national exposure came when CBS brought him aboard in 1955 to co-host the children's travelogue, Let's Take a Trip... live, remote location, no audience, no sponsors", Fox himself described that show, during interviews for PBS
's The American Experience
.
Fox became the first host of The $64,000 Challenge, the game show spinoff of The $64,000 Question, in 1956, but he was fired a few weeks into the series and replaced by Ralph Story
, reportedly because he simply wasn't as funny or bright hosting the game as he was in person, according to producer
s. Fox himself admitted later (in the same PBS interviews, regarding the quiz show scandal of 1958-1959), that he was so awkward he "had a predilection for asking the answers."
But Fox's blink-of-an-eye tenure on the show may have been the biggest break of his career. He escaped any taint from the coming quiz show scandal, though he told The American Experience he'd been horrified by some of the testimony to Congress
---including that of child star Patty Duke
(who once played The $64,000 Challenge), who eventually admitted in tears that she'd been coached to lie to Congressional investigators. By that time, Fox's involvement in game shows went no further than occasionally filling in for the original host of The Price is Right
, Bill Cullen
, or Beat the Clock
host Bud Collyer
.
It turned out that the job for which he was suited best came the year the quiz scandals accelerated: Independent television network Metromedia
(born of the ashes of the former DuMont
Network) hired Fox to host Wonderama
on its New York flagship station, WABD (soon to become WNEW-TV
), succeeding the team of Bill Britten
and Doris Faye. Hiring Fox ended what some called the "musical-hosts syndrome" that Wonderama had for its first few years. The show had been created as well as originally hosted by actor-comedian Sandy Becker
, who became a New York children's program star in his own right. Fox became Wonderama's sole host for eight years, until August 1967.
Suave, congenial, and dryly witty, Fox balanced effortlessly between the serious and the slapstick
, turning the marathon Wonderama (during Fox's tenure the show ran for four hours on Sunday mornings) into a weekly academy at which anything could happen and often did---whether Shakespearean dramatizations, guest celebrities, magic demonstrations (customarily by legendary magician James "The Amazing" Randi
), art instruction, spelling bee
s, learning games, or other elements.
Fox was deft at balancing what could have been a haphazard hodgepodge into a seamless whole, and he was consistent in never talking down to his young guests and viewers, treating them with legitimate respect and tolerance. The result was that Wonderama, all four hours worth, was rarely if ever known to have bored either the children who appeared on the show (the segments showing the weekly 25 or 30 children waving cross-armed, leading in and out of commercial breaks, were as much a signature as Fox himself) or those who watched it.
For a few years it seemed as though Fox owned children's weekend television in the New York metropolitan area. In the same year he joined Wonderama, he reached back to the "color war
" team competitions he knew as a child in summer camp
to create and host Just For Fun, a two-and-a-half hour Saturday morning show involving two teams of kids in Blue and Gold jumpsuits to compete in contests ranging from the mildly athletic to the wildly bizarre. One mainstay was the Treasure Chest competition: One contestant from each team would be placed in front of a locked chest and 1,000 keys. When the winner found the key to open their chest, a siren would sound, and whatever was happening at the time (be it cartoon, commercial, skit, etc.) was interrupted. The winner would stand with arms outstretched and a towering pile of board games and toys would be placed in their arms.
A year later, Fox hosted ABC
's first original Saturday morning show, On Your Mark, a game show in which children ages 9 through 13 answered questions about various professions. On Your Mark lasted one season, but the lively Just For Fun lasted until 1965. Fox left Wonderama in 1967; his successor, Bob McAllister
, continued the show both locally (in New York City), and in national syndication through the 1970s. Fox gradually withdrew from television work (he'd also played Mr. Prim in the 1966 film The Christmas That Almost Wasn't
), spending time in theater and other entertainment while raising his own four children. He spent one year (1977) running children's programming for NBC
(and taking one more stab at hosting, with the short-lived Way Out Games in 1976), while spending time concurrently as a lecturer
at the State University of New York at Stony Brook
campus in the 1970s.
Fox also co-hosted a daily talk/variety show for adults titled The New Yorkers on WNEW, with co-hosts Penelope Wilson and Gloria Okon, plus newsman Stewart Klein. Airing weekdays during the 1967 TV season, the series was not a hit and was canceled after a few weeks.
Fox's last venture in children's TV was as the co-executive producer of the short-lived Chuck McCann
's Fun Stuff. The series was seen weekday mornings locally on KHJ-TV Ch. 9 in Los Angeles
from September 18, 1989 until October 13, 1989.
Fox later joined and became a chairman of the board
for Population Communications International, a New York-based nonprofit concern dedicated to influencing media coverage and presentation of family planning issues—including work with U.S. and international soap opera
producers, helping them develop "more healthful" family planning story lines, as a newspaper article described it in 2002.
Television
Television is a telecommunication medium for transmitting and receiving moving images that can be monochrome or colored, with accompanying sound...
host, executive and broadcasting consultant, who was the fourth full-time host of the children's television program, Wonderama
Wonderama
Wonderama was a long-running children's television program that appeared on the Metromedia-owned stations from 1955 to 1986, with WNEW-TV in New York City being its originating station....
.
Biography
A World War IIWorld War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
veteran, Fox's first experience in children's programming came in 1954, with a St. Louis
St. Louis, Missouri
St. Louis is an independent city on the eastern border of Missouri, United States. With a population of 319,294, it was the 58th-largest U.S. city at the 2010 U.S. Census. The Greater St...
program, The Finder on KETC
KETC
KETC is the Public Broadcasting Service member Public television station in St. Louis, Missouri. Owned by St. Louis Regional Public Media, the call letters KETC represent the St. Louis Educational Television Comission, the former name of the organization responsible for bringing public television...
-TV, a children's news and travelogue program. His first national exposure came when CBS brought him aboard in 1955 to co-host the children's travelogue, Let's Take a Trip... live, remote location, no audience, no sponsors", Fox himself described that show, during interviews for PBS
Public Broadcasting Service
The Public Broadcasting Service is an American non-profit public broadcasting television network with 354 member TV stations in the United States which hold collective ownership. Its headquarters is in Arlington, Virginia....
's The American Experience
American Experience
American Experience is a television program airing on the Public Broadcasting Service Public television stations in the United States. The program airs documentaries, many of which have won awards, about important or interesting events and people in American history...
.
Fox became the first host of The $64,000 Challenge, the game show spinoff of The $64,000 Question, in 1956, but he was fired a few weeks into the series and replaced by Ralph Story
Ralph Story
Ralph Story, originally Ralph Bernard Snyder was an American television and radio personality. He was best remembered as the host of The $64,000 Challenge, a spin off of the game show The $64,000 Question, from 1956 until 1958.-Biography:Story was born Ralph Bernard Snyder in Kalamazoo, Michigan...
, reportedly because he simply wasn't as funny or bright hosting the game as he was in person, according to producer
Television producer
The primary role of a television Producer is to allow all aspects of video production, ranging from show idea development and cast hiring to shoot supervision and fact-checking...
s. Fox himself admitted later (in the same PBS interviews, regarding the quiz show scandal of 1958-1959), that he was so awkward he "had a predilection for asking the answers."
But Fox's blink-of-an-eye tenure on the show may have been the biggest break of his career. He escaped any taint from the coming quiz show scandal, though he told The American Experience he'd been horrified by some of the testimony to Congress
United States Congress
The United States Congress is the bicameral legislature of the federal government of the United States, consisting of the Senate and the House of Representatives. The Congress meets in the United States Capitol in Washington, D.C....
---including that of child star Patty Duke
Patty Duke
Anna Marie "Patty" Duke is an American actress of stage, film, and television. First becoming famous as a child star, winning an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress at age 16, and later starring in her eponymous sitcom for three years, she progressed to more mature roles upon playing Neely...
(who once played The $64,000 Challenge), who eventually admitted in tears that she'd been coached to lie to Congressional investigators. By that time, Fox's involvement in game shows went no further than occasionally filling in for the original host of The Price is Right
The Price Is Right
The Price Is Right is a television game show franchise originally produced by Mark Goodson and Bill Todman, and created by Bob Stewart, and is currently produced and owned by FremantleMedia. The franchise centers on television game shows, but also includes merchandise such as video games, printed...
, Bill Cullen
Bill Cullen
William Lawrence Francis "Bill" Cullen was an American radio and television personality whose career spanned five decades...
, or Beat the Clock
Beat the Clock
Beat the Clock is a Goodson-Todman game show which has aired on American television in several versions since 1950.The original show, hosted by Bud Collyer, ran on CBS from 1950–1958 and ABC from 1958–1961. The show was revived in syndication as The New Beat the Clock from 1969–1974, with Jack Narz...
host Bud Collyer
Bud Collyer
Bud Collyer was an American radio actor/announcer who became one of the nation's first major television game show stars...
.
It turned out that the job for which he was suited best came the year the quiz scandals accelerated: Independent television network Metromedia
Metromedia
Metromedia was a media company that owned radio and television stations in the United States from 1956 to 1986 and owned Orion Pictures from 1986-1997.- Overview :...
(born of the ashes of the former DuMont
DuMont Television Network
The DuMont Television Network, also known as the DuMont Network, DuMont, Du Mont, or Dumont was one of the world's pioneer commercial television networks, rivalling NBC for the distinction of being first overall. It began operation in the United States in 1946. It was owned by DuMont...
Network) hired Fox to host Wonderama
Wonderama
Wonderama was a long-running children's television program that appeared on the Metromedia-owned stations from 1955 to 1986, with WNEW-TV in New York City being its originating station....
on its New York flagship station, WABD (soon to become WNEW-TV
WNYW
WNYW, virtual channel 5 , is the flagship television station of the News Corporation-owned Fox Broadcasting Company, located in New York City. The station's transmitter is atop the Empire State Building and its studio facilities are located in the Yorkville section of Manhattan...
), succeeding the team of Bill Britten
Bill Britten
Bill Britten is an American actor best known for his portrayal of Bozo the Clown. He performed as a mimic and pantomimist for local parties in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, before enrolling in college. He studied clown makeup at Temple University, later attending the University of Washington in Seattle...
and Doris Faye. Hiring Fox ended what some called the "musical-hosts syndrome" that Wonderama had for its first few years. The show had been created as well as originally hosted by actor-comedian Sandy Becker
Sandy Becker
George Sanford Becker , who was known professionally as Sandy Becker, was a television announcer, actor, and comedian who hosted several popular children's programs in New York City...
, who became a New York children's program star in his own right. Fox became Wonderama's sole host for eight years, until August 1967.
Suave, congenial, and dryly witty, Fox balanced effortlessly between the serious and the slapstick
Slapstick
Slapstick is a type of comedy involving exaggerated violence and activities which may exceed the boundaries of common sense.- Origins :The phrase comes from the batacchio or bataccio — called the 'slap stick' in English — a club-like object composed of two wooden slats used in Commedia dell'arte...
, turning the marathon Wonderama (during Fox's tenure the show ran for four hours on Sunday mornings) into a weekly academy at which anything could happen and often did---whether Shakespearean dramatizations, guest celebrities, magic demonstrations (customarily by legendary magician James "The Amazing" Randi
James Randi
James Randi is a Canadian-American stage magician and scientific skeptic best known as a challenger of paranormal claims and pseudoscience. Randi is the founder of the James Randi Educational Foundation...
), art instruction, spelling bee
Spelling bee
A spelling bee is a competition where contestants, usually children, are asked to spell English words. The concept is thought to have originated in the United States....
s, learning games, or other elements.
Fox was deft at balancing what could have been a haphazard hodgepodge into a seamless whole, and he was consistent in never talking down to his young guests and viewers, treating them with legitimate respect and tolerance. The result was that Wonderama, all four hours worth, was rarely if ever known to have bored either the children who appeared on the show (the segments showing the weekly 25 or 30 children waving cross-armed, leading in and out of commercial breaks, were as much a signature as Fox himself) or those who watched it.
For a few years it seemed as though Fox owned children's weekend television in the New York metropolitan area. In the same year he joined Wonderama, he reached back to the "color war
Color war
Color war is a meta-game played in summer camps, schools and some social organizations . Participants are divided into teams, each of which is assigned a color. The teams compete against each other in challenges and events to earn points...
" team competitions he knew as a child in summer camp
Summer camp
Summer camp is a supervised program for children or teenagers conducted during the summer months in some countries. Children and adolescents who attend summer camp are known as campers....
to create and host Just For Fun, a two-and-a-half hour Saturday morning show involving two teams of kids in Blue and Gold jumpsuits to compete in contests ranging from the mildly athletic to the wildly bizarre. One mainstay was the Treasure Chest competition: One contestant from each team would be placed in front of a locked chest and 1,000 keys. When the winner found the key to open their chest, a siren would sound, and whatever was happening at the time (be it cartoon, commercial, skit, etc.) was interrupted. The winner would stand with arms outstretched and a towering pile of board games and toys would be placed in their arms.
A year later, Fox hosted ABC
American Broadcasting Company
The American Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network. Created in 1943 from the former NBC Blue radio network, ABC is owned by The Walt Disney Company and is part of Disney-ABC Television Group. Its first broadcast on television was in 1948...
's first original Saturday morning show, On Your Mark, a game show in which children ages 9 through 13 answered questions about various professions. On Your Mark lasted one season, but the lively Just For Fun lasted until 1965. Fox left Wonderama in 1967; his successor, Bob McAllister
Bob McAllister
Bob McAllister was an American television personality, magician and children's entertainer and a host of Wonderama. -Early career:...
, continued the show both locally (in New York City), and in national syndication through the 1970s. Fox gradually withdrew from television work (he'd also played Mr. Prim in the 1966 film The Christmas That Almost Wasn't
The Christmas That Almost Wasn't
The Christmas That Almost Wasn't is a 1966 film that stars Rossano Brazzi and Paul Tripp. The movie had traditional December airings on Home Box Office during the 1970s and early 1980s. The title in Italian is known as 'Natale che quasi non fu'....
), spending time in theater and other entertainment while raising his own four children. He spent one year (1977) running children's programming for NBC
NBC
The 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...
(and taking one more stab at hosting, with the short-lived Way Out Games in 1976), while spending time concurrently as a lecturer
Lecturer
Lecturer is an academic rank. In the United Kingdom, lecturer is a position at a university or similar institution, often held by academics in their early career stages, who lead research groups and supervise research students, as well as teach...
at the State University of New York at Stony Brook
State University of New York at Stony Brook
The State University of New York at Stony Brook, also known as Stony Brook University, is a public research university located in Stony Brook, New York, on the North Shore of Long Island, about east of Manhattan....
campus in the 1970s.
Fox also co-hosted a daily talk/variety show for adults titled The New Yorkers on WNEW, with co-hosts Penelope Wilson and Gloria Okon, plus newsman Stewart Klein. Airing weekdays during the 1967 TV season, the series was not a hit and was canceled after a few weeks.
Fox's last venture in children's TV was as the co-executive producer of the short-lived Chuck McCann
Chuck McCann
Chuck McCann is a film actor, television actor, stage actor, and a voice actor from Brooklyn, New York.-Early career:...
's Fun Stuff. The series was seen weekday mornings locally on KHJ-TV Ch. 9 in Los Angeles
Los Ángeles
Los Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the commune of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123,445 inhabitants...
from September 18, 1989 until October 13, 1989.
Fox later joined and became a chairman of the board
Chairman of the Board
The Chairman of the Board is a seat of office in an organization, especially of corporations.Chairman of the Board may also refer to:*Chairman of the Board , a 1998 film*Chairmen of the Board , a 1970s American soul music group...
for Population Communications International, a New York-based nonprofit concern dedicated to influencing media coverage and presentation of family planning issues—including work with U.S. and international soap opera
Soap opera
A soap opera, sometimes called "soap" for short, is an ongoing, episodic work of dramatic fiction presented in serial format on radio or as television programming. The name soap opera stems from the original dramatic serials broadcast on radio that had soap manufacturers, such as Procter & Gamble,...
producers, helping them develop "more healthful" family planning story lines, as a newspaper article described it in 2002.