Phil Donahue, whose influential TV talk show aired for nearly 30 years, has died at age 88.
Donahue died Sunday night of an undisclosed illness, according to a family statement provided to ABC News by a representative for Donahue’s wife of 44 years, actress Marlo Thomas.
The family requests in lieu of flowers that donations be made to St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital or the Phil Donahue/Notre Dame Scholarship Fund, according to the statement.
After working as a local TV reporter in his native Ohio and launching a talk show on local CBS affiliate WHIO in Dayton, he moved his The Phil Donahue Show to the local NBC affiliate WLWD, also in Dayton, in 1967. Three years later, it entered nationwide syndication, now simply titled Donahue.
The show would run for 26 years in syndication, produced at NBC’s 30 Rockefeller Plaza, until its last show in September 1996.
He is survived by his wife, Thomas, to whom he had been married for 44 years.
Donahue rose to national prominence for its compelling guests and its pioneering, open-forum interview style, where audience members could ask questions of the guest and fans could call in to the show. That format was soon emulated by others who followed, including Oprah Winfrey and Sally Jessy Raphael.
Donahue also prompted conversations around fringe figures, like Ku Klux Klansman David Duke, whom he interviewed in 1978.
“You don’t fix racism by throwing a blanket over the people who are racist. Put them on, let’s hear them,” said Donahue, discussing the Duke interview with Television Academy Foundation.
Donahue earned 20 career Emmy Awards for Donahue and, in 1992, the Television Academy inducted him into its Hall of Fame. In 1980, he was awarded a personal Peabody Award, and in May, he was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by President Joe Biden.
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