Phil Donahue, more often known as the “King of Daytime Talk,” passed away on Sunday, August 18, at the age of 88. He was the creator and presenter of the show known as The Phil Donahue Show.
at a statement that was received by PEOPLE, Donahue’s family said that the pioneering television talk show journalist passed away at his home surrounded by his family. This included his wife of 44 years, the actress Marlo Thomas, as well as “his sister, his children, grandchildren, and his beloved golden retriever, Charlie.”
The message conveyed the information that he “passed away peacefully following a long illness.”
In the late 1950s, Donahue started his career in the media by working in talk radio and television. He was born on December 21, 1935, and he spent his childhood in Cleveland. His talk program, which bears his name, was launched in Dayton, Ohio, in the year 1967. A weeklong series that took place in the Ohio state jail in 1971 helped the program earn credibility and attention for its contentious subject matter and for the fact that it took viewers behind bars for the duration of the series.
The Phil Donahue Show was the first program to give audience members the opportunity to ask guests questions, and it concentrated each hour-long broadcast to a single topic, such as the abuse of children by the Catholic Church, feminism, and racial relations. After moving the program to Chicago and changing its name to Donahue in 1974, the host was able to find his place in the industry while also introducing new ideas to the daytime format.
“When Phil came to Chicago, he found his most important element — the Chicago studio audience,” Ron Weiner, the former director of Donahue, said to WGN-TV in 2023. Weiner was one of the people who created the show. “From that point, the program really took off.”
Donahue further said, “One day, I just went out in the audience, and it’s clear there would be no Donahue show if I hadn’t somehow accidentally brought in the audience.”
Following that, in January of 1985, the program relocated to New York City. As Donahue proceeded to create new ground in daytime television by conducting interviews with politicians, activists, singers, sports, and actors while broadcasting live from 30 Rockefeller Plaza, he continued to break new ground.
In January of 1987, he was the first presenter to record five episodes in the Soviet Union, as reported by the Tampa Bay Times. Nelson Mandela made his first appearance on a talk show via satellite from Lusaka, Zambia, in March of 1990. Donahue took the opportunity to do an interview with him. The program was the host of the most prominent televised discussion between Bill Clinton and Jerry Brown Jr., both of whom were candidates for the Democratic presidential nomination in April of 1992. There was no audience, no moderator, and no commercial break throughout the debate.
Other prominent celebrities who have attended the event throughout the years include Sammy Davis Jr., Ralph Nader, Elton John, Gloria Steinem, Gregory Peck, Billy Crystal, Whoopi Goldberg, Robin Williams, Dolly Parton, Muhammad Ali, Michael J. Fox, Roseanne Barr, Steve Martin, Richard Pryor, and a great number of others.
Donahue went on to win a total of twenty Emmy Awards, ten of which were for best host and ten for the talk show itself. She also paved the way for other daytime hosts, including Geraldo Rivera, Sally Jesse Raphael, Ricki Lake, Montel Williams, and Oprah Winfrey, all of whom had their shows rooted in Chicago, much like Donahue’s.
“If there had been no Phil Donahue show, there would have been no Oprah Winfrey Show,” Winfrey wrote in the issue of O, the Oprah Magazine, that was published in September of 2002. “He was the first to acknowledge that women are interested in more than mascara tips and cake recipes — that we’re intelligent, we’re concerned about the world around us and we want the best possible lives for ourselves.”
The talk show continued to be based in New York City until September 1996, when it was finally taped for the last time after 29 years of broadcasting. Having taken a break from primetime television for a period of six years, its namesake made his comeback in 2002 to anchor the interview-based show known as Donahue. However, according to The New York Times, MSNBC decided to terminate the program with the same name in February of 2003 because of the low number of viewers. After the program was canceled, he went on to write, co-direct, and produce the documentary titled “Body of War,” which was released in 2007.
In 1980, Donahue wed actress Marlo Thomas, whom he had first met in 1977 when she appeared as a guest on his talk show. This occurrence marked the beginning of their second marriage. Thomas revealed his thoughts on the matter in a nostalgic post on Facebook, stating that “it was instant chemistry.” In subsequent years, the pair collaborated on the writing of the book titled “What Makes a Marriage Last: 40 Celebrated Couples Share with Us the Secrets to a Happy Life in 2020.”
According to a statement that Thomas made to PEOPLE in May 2023, “love, listening, and lust” were the factors that contributed to the success of her marriage to Donahue.
She said, “You have to listen, and then you will know what the other person is truly thinking and going through before you can understand them.” You are required to love one another. And if you don’t have passion, you really don’t have anything,” she said, before adding, “He is the finest.” I have a lot of good fortune.”
Thomas and his four children from his previous wife, Michael, Kevin, Daniel, and Mary Rose, are the only people who will remember Donahue after his passing. The death of his son James “Jim” Patrick, who passed away in 2014 due to an aortic aneurysm at the age of 51, is the cause of his passing.
