Gene Rayburn
Encyclopedia
Gene Rayburn was an American radio
and television
personality. He is best known as the host of various editions of the popular American television game show Match Game
for over two decades.
Born Eugene Rubessa (icon) in Christopher, Illinois
, he was an only child of Croatia
n immigrants and graduated from Lindblom Technical High School and later from Knox College. While a student at Lindblom, he was Senior Class President and acted in the plays "Robert of Sicily," and "Mrs. Wiggs of the Cabbage Patch."
Rayburn was married to Helen Ticknor from 1940 until her death in October 1996. They had one child, a daughter, Lynn. After the birth of their child, Rayburn enlisted in the U.S. Army Air Force, for World War II
service.
radio show in New York, first with Jack Lescoulie
(Anything Goes) and later with Dee Finch (Rayburn & Finch) on WNEW-AM (now WBBR
). Radio history pegs Rayburn's pairings with Lescoulie and Finch as the first two-man teams in morning radio. When Rayburn left WNEW, Dee Finch continued the format with Gene Klavan
.
He also landed the lead in the Broadway musical Bye Bye Birdie after Dick Van Dyke
left the production to star in the classic sitcom which bears his name.
's Tonight, Gene Rayburn began a long association with game-show producers Mark Goodson
and Bill Todman
in 1953. He first appeared on Robert Q. Lewis
's The Name's the Same
; Rayburn frequently sat in for regular panelist Carl Reiner
, lending a comic touch to the panel. In 1955, he took over as host of the summer-replacement game show, Make the Connection
, from original host, Jim McKay
. From there he hosted shows such as Choose Up Sides
, Dough Re Mi
, and the daytime version of Tic Tac Dough. On radio, Rayburn became one of the many hosts of the NBC program Monitor
in 1961 and remained with the show until 1973.
In an uncredited role (he reportedly did not want his name to appear), Rayburn played a TV interviewer in the 1959 movie, It Happened to Jane
starring Doris Day
.
Rayburn was also a frequent panelist in the 1960s and '70s on What's My Line?
and To Tell the Truth
, where the interviewing skills he had burnished on Monitor made him a popular questioner.
. The original version, which aired from New York on NBC
, had Rayburn reading questions to two panels. Each panel consisted of a celebrity and two audience members. The questions in the original game were ordinary, like "Name a kind of muffin," or "John loves his ____________." Rayburn's hosting duties were usually straightfoward, although he would occasionally make jokes as the situation warranted. Because it was a live show, broadcast weekdays at 4:00 p. m. Eastern time, very few episodes were recorded for posterity; only four half-hours are known to exist. The show was cancelled in 1969 to make room for the topical, short-lived game show Letters to Laugh-In
.
Goodson-Todman revived The Match Game in 1973, for CBS. Gene Rayburn returned as host, and introduced a new format in which two contestants had to match the responses of six celebrities. Writer Dick DeBartolo
, a veteran of the original show, now came up with funnier and usually naughtier questions ("After being hit by a steamroller, Norman had to slide his ____________ under the door.") Rayburn reveled in this free-wheeling new approach, and often indulged in funny voices, banter with the celebrities, and mock arguments with the technical crew. Millions tuned in, and it soon became the highest-rated show in daytime television history.
From 1973 to 1977, it was #1 among all daytime network game shows — three of those years the highest rated in all of daytime — fueled by the zany questions and Rayburn's witty style. The show is often remembered not for the celebrity panels, but for Rayburn's antics, including breaking through the entrance doors, roller-skating on stage, and modeling fashions for the audience.
The daytime revival of The Match Game, which featured regular panelists Richard Dawson, 1973 to 1978, Brett Somers
and Charles Nelson Reilly
, ran until 1979 on CBS and another three years in first-run syndication until 1982, with a concurrent night-time version, Match Game PM, airing from 1975 to 1980. Rayburn was nominated for two Daytime Emmy Awards for Outstanding Host or Hostess in a Game or Audience Participation Show.
During the years when The Match Game was taped in Los Angeles, Rayburn lived in Osterville, Massachusetts
, on Cape Cod
, and would commute to California every two weeks to tape 12 shows over the course of a weekend (five daytime shows and one nighttime show per taping day).
In 1983, a year after the syndicated Match Game disappeared, the show was revived as part of the Match Game-Hollywood Squares Hour
, with Rayburn hosting the Match Game segment and sitting on the panel of the Hollywood Squares
segment. The show lasted nine months on NBC.
Perhaps one of the most famous Match Game moments came during a taping in 1974 when Rayburn unintentionally told a contestant, Karen Lesko, that she had "pretty nipples," meaning to say "dimples." The incident was cut from the original CBS episode.
He knitted socks as a publicity stunt during his time on Rayburn and Finch and later became avid in needlepoint, so much to the point that he would constantly do some in plane rides from New York
to Match Game tapings in Hollywood. In a 1974 Match Game episode, program packager Mark Goodson
made a surprise visit to congratulate the host on making the show #1 among daytime television programs and Goodson gave Rayburn a needlepoint bag as a gift.
During his time in the Air Force, Rayburn was trained in meteorology
and occasionally demonstrated his knowledge of the weather on Match Game.
-Todman
shows, What's My Line?
and To Tell the Truth
, where he exhibited the same inquisitiveness on serious subjects he showed on Match Game. Also during the run of the 1970s Match Game, Gene and wife Helen appeared on the game show Tattletales, hosted by Bert Convy
. Gene was a long time host on NBC Radio's Monitor. Three years after the original Match Game was cancelled, Rayburn hosted the short-lived Heatter-Quigley Productions
show, The Amateur's Guide to Love
(1972). He also hosted a pilot for Reg Grundy Productions
in 1983 called Party Line, which later became Bruce Forsyth's Hot Streak
.
Rayburn appeared as a contestant during a tournament of game show hosts on the original version of Card Sharks
in 1980 and was also an occasional celebrity guest on Password Plus for several weeks between 1980 and 1982.
Rayburn appeared on Fantasy Island
as a game-show host — he and another host were game show rivals who wanted to do the ultimate game show to win the woman they both loved; Roarke accommodated them with a game-show set, but the host's chair was more like a throne, and death was a real possibility. In the end, the two men, in a dead heat, were offered a final tie-breaker, a "sudden death" round.
Rayburn once hosted a local New York City-based show on WNEW-TV (now WNYW), Helluva Town, and in between game show stints in 1982-83, he returned to WNEW as host of a weekly local talk/lifestyles show called Saturday Morning Live. His tenure was brief when he ultimately accepted the hosting assignment for The Match Game/Hollywood Squares Hour.
The final game shows Rayburn emceed were 1985's Break the Bank
, where Rayburn was fired after 13 weeks and replaced by Joe Farago
, and The Movie Masters
, an AMC cable
game show that ran from 1989 to 1990.
Right before production was to begin on a new Rayburn-emceed Match Game revival in 1985, an Entertainment Tonight
reporter publicly disclosed his age, which was much older than many people believed. Rayburn had trouble finding jobs after that, blaming the reporter for disclosing his age and subjecting him to age discrimination
.
Rayburn portrayed himself on a Saturday Night Live
sketch in 1990, which featured Susan Lucci
(as her character from All My Children
, Erica Kane
). He returned as one of Kane's previous husbands (alluding to Erica Kane's many marriages during her stint on that show), stopping another marriage (officiated by his old "Choose Up Sides
" co-star Don Pardo
) with the host of a game show portrayed by Phil Hartman
. He also continued to make appearances on talk shows throughout the late 1980s and 1990s, usually to discuss classic game shows, including appearances on The Late Show with Ross Shafer
(Shafer would host the ensuing Match Game revival when it premiered in 1990), Vicki!
and The Maury Povich Show
.
intended to coincide with the 25th anniversary of the CBS Match Game. Portions of the interview have been re-shown on the Game Show Network
which in 2001 showed portions of another previously unaired interview during the first airing of its Match Game Blankathon.
Rayburn died at his daughter Lynne Rayburn's Beverly, Massachusetts
home of congestive heart failure
on November 29, 1999, one month after receiving a Lifetime Achievement award from the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences (Rayburn, though in very poor health at the time, arrived to accept the award himself). He was cremated and his ashes spread in the garden of his daughter's home.
Radio
Radio is the transmission of signals through free space by modulation of electromagnetic waves with frequencies below those of visible light. Electromagnetic radiation travels by means of oscillating electromagnetic fields that pass through the air and the vacuum of space...
and television
Television
Television is a telecommunication medium for transmitting and receiving moving images that can be monochrome or colored, with accompanying sound...
personality. He is best known as the host of various editions of the popular American television game show Match Game
Match Game
Match Game is an American television game show in which contestants attempted to match celebrities' answers to fill-in-the-blank questions...
for over two decades.
Born Eugene Rubessa (icon) in Christopher, Illinois
Christopher, Illinois
Christopher is a city in Franklin County, Illinois, United States. The population was 2,382 at the 2010 census. It was the site of an early-morning railroad freight train derailment on Monday, December 4, 2006, involving two locomotives and 21 cars of an 83-car Union Pacific train; an unknown...
, he was an only child of Croatia
Croatia
Croatia , officially the Republic of Croatia , is a unitary democratic parliamentary republic in Europe at the crossroads of the Mitteleuropa, the Balkans, and the Mediterranean. Its capital and largest city is Zagreb. The country is divided into 20 counties and the city of Zagreb. Croatia covers ...
n immigrants and graduated from Lindblom Technical High School and later from Knox College. While a student at Lindblom, he was Senior Class President and acted in the plays "Robert of Sicily," and "Mrs. Wiggs of the Cabbage Patch."
Rayburn was married to Helen Ticknor from 1940 until her death in October 1996. They had one child, a daughter, Lynn. After the birth of their child, Rayburn enlisted in the U.S. Army Air Force, for World War II
World 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...
service.
Radio career
Before appearing in television, Rayburn was a very successful actor and radio performer. He had a popular morning drive timeDrive time
Drive time is the daypart analog to prime time for radio broadcasting. It consists of the morning hours when listeners wake up, get ready, and/or head to work or school, and the afternoon hours when they are heading home and before their evening meal. These are the periods where the number of...
radio show in New York, first with Jack Lescoulie
Jack Lescoulie
Jack Lescoulie was a radio and television announcer and host, notably on NBC's Today during the 1950s and 1960s. His parents were both in vaudeville along with their children; Lescoulie's first public performance was at age seven. His first media job was with KGFJ, Los Angeles, when he was still...
(Anything Goes) and later with Dee Finch (Rayburn & Finch) on WNEW-AM (now WBBR
WBBR
WBBR is a radio station broadcasting at 1130 AM in New York City. It airs Bloomberg Radio, a service of Bloomberg L.P. WBBR's format is general and financial news, offering local, national and international news reports along with financial market updates and interviews with corporate executives,...
). Radio history pegs Rayburn's pairings with Lescoulie and Finch as the first two-man teams in morning radio. When Rayburn left WNEW, Dee Finch continued the format with Gene Klavan
Gene Klavan
Gene Klavan , was an American disc-jockey columnist and author.-Early years:Klavan was born in Baltimore, Md. and attended Baltimore City College . His radio career began at WTOP in Washington D.C...
.
He also landed the lead in the Broadway musical Bye Bye Birdie after Dick Van Dyke
Dick Van Dyke
Richard Wayne "Dick" Van Dyke is an American actor, comedian, writer, and producer with a career spanning six decades. He is the older brother of Jerry Van Dyke, and father of Barry Van Dyke...
left the production to star in the classic sitcom which bears his name.
Television career
Breaking into television as the original announcer on Steve AllenSteve Allen
Steve Allen may refer to:*Steve Allen , American musician, comedian, and writer*Steve Allen , presenter on the London-based talk radio station LBC 97.3...
's Tonight, Gene Rayburn began a long association with game-show producers Mark Goodson
Mark Goodson
Mark Goodson was an American television producer who specialized in game shows.-Life and early career:...
and Bill Todman
Bill Todman
William S. "Bill" Todman was an American television producer born in New York City. He produced many of television's longest running shows with business partner Mark Goodson.-Early life:...
in 1953. He first appeared on Robert Q. Lewis
Robert Q. Lewis
Robert Q. Lewis was an American radio and television personality, game show host, and actor. Lewis added the middle initial "Q." to his name accidentally on the air in 1942, when he responded to a reference to radio comedian F. Chase Taylor's character, Colonel Lemuel Q...
's The Name's the Same
The Name's the Same
The Name's the Same is an American game show that was produced by Goodson-Todman for the ABC television network from December 5, 1951 to August 31, 1954, followed by a run from October 25, 1954 to October 7, 1955....
; Rayburn frequently sat in for regular panelist Carl Reiner
Carl Reiner
Carl Reiner is an American actor, film director, producer, writer and comedian. He has won nine Emmy Awards and one Grammy Award during this career...
, lending a comic touch to the panel. In 1955, he took over as host of the summer-replacement game show, Make the Connection
Make the Connection
Make the Connection is an American game show, sponsored by Borden, that ran on Thursday nights from July 7 to September 29, 1955 on NBC. Originally hosted by Jim McKay , he was replaced after the first four episodes by future Match Game host Gene...
, from original host, Jim McKay
Jim McKay
James Kenneth McManus , better known by his professional name of Jim McKay, was an American television sports journalist....
. From there he hosted shows such as Choose Up Sides
Choose Up Sides
Choose Up Sides was a children's television game show that aired on NBC Saturday mornings from January 7 to March 31, 1956. It was hosted by Gene Rayburn and announced by Don Pardo and produced by Goodson-Todman Productions-NBC version:...
, Dough Re Mi
Dough Re Mi
Dough Re Mi was an American game show that aired on NBC from February 24, 1958 to December 30, 1960. The series was hosted by Gene Rayburn and was somewhat of an answer to CBS' Name That Tune, which began in 1953....
, and the daytime version of Tic Tac Dough. On radio, Rayburn became one of the many hosts of the NBC program Monitor
Monitor (NBC Radio)
NBC Monitor was an American weekend radio program broadcast from June 12, 1955, until January 26, 1975. Airing live and nationwide on the NBC Radio Network, it originally aired beginning Saturday morning at 8am and continuing through the weekend until 12 midnight on Sunday...
in 1961 and remained with the show until 1973.
In an uncredited role (he reportedly did not want his name to appear), Rayburn played a TV interviewer in the 1959 movie, It Happened to Jane
It Happened to Jane
It Happened to Jane is a 1959 romantic comedy film starring Doris Day, Jack Lemmon, and Ernie Kovacs directed by Richard Quine and written by Norman Katkov and Max Wilk.The film was co-produced by Quine and star Day's husband at the time, Martin Melcher....
starring Doris Day
Doris Day
Doris Day is an American actress, singer and, since her retirement from show business, an animal rights activist. With an entertainment career that spanned through almost 50 years, Day started her career as a big band singer in 1939, but only began to be noticed after her first hit recording,...
.
Rayburn was also a frequent panelist in the 1960s and '70s on What's My Line?
What's My Line?
What's My Line? is a panel game show which originally ran in the United States on the CBS Television Network from 1950 to 1967, with several international versions and subsequent U.S. revivals. The game tasked celebrity panelists with questioning contestants in order to determine their occupations....
and To Tell the Truth
To Tell the Truth
To Tell the Truth is an American television panel game show created by Bob Stewart and produced by Goodson-Todman Productions that has aired in various forms since 1956 both on networks and in syndication...
, where the interviewing skills he had burnished on Monitor made him a popular questioner.
The Match Game
From 1962 to 1969 Rayburn hosted The Match GameMatch Game
Match Game is an American television game show in which contestants attempted to match celebrities' answers to fill-in-the-blank questions...
. The original version, which aired from New York on 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...
, had Rayburn reading questions to two panels. Each panel consisted of a celebrity and two audience members. The questions in the original game were ordinary, like "Name a kind of muffin," or "John loves his ____________." Rayburn's hosting duties were usually straightfoward, although he would occasionally make jokes as the situation warranted. Because it was a live show, broadcast weekdays at 4:00 p. m. Eastern time, very few episodes were recorded for posterity; only four half-hours are known to exist. The show was cancelled in 1969 to make room for the topical, short-lived game show Letters to Laugh-In
Letters to Laugh-In
Letters to Laugh-In is a daytime game show and spin-off of NBC's popular nighttime comedy series at the time, Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In, that aired on the network from September 29 to December 26, 1969...
.
Goodson-Todman revived The Match Game in 1973, for CBS. Gene Rayburn returned as host, and introduced a new format in which two contestants had to match the responses of six celebrities. Writer Dick DeBartolo
Dick DeBartolo
Dick DeBartolo is an American writer. He has most notably written for Mad. He is occasionally referred to as "Mads Maddest Writer," this being a twist on Don Martin's former status as "Mads Maddest Artist." DeBartolo served as the magazine's "Creative Consultant" from 1984 to 2009.Mad has long...
, a veteran of the original show, now came up with funnier and usually naughtier questions ("After being hit by a steamroller, Norman had to slide his ____________ under the door.") Rayburn reveled in this free-wheeling new approach, and often indulged in funny voices, banter with the celebrities, and mock arguments with the technical crew. Millions tuned in, and it soon became the highest-rated show in daytime television history.
From 1973 to 1977, it was #1 among all daytime network game shows — three of those years the highest rated in all of daytime — fueled by the zany questions and Rayburn's witty style. The show is often remembered not for the celebrity panels, but for Rayburn's antics, including breaking through the entrance doors, roller-skating on stage, and modeling fashions for the audience.
The daytime revival of The Match Game, which featured regular panelists Richard Dawson, 1973 to 1978, Brett Somers
Brett Somers
Brett Somers was a American actress, singer, and comedienne who was born in Canada and raised in Maine...
and Charles Nelson Reilly
Charles Nelson Reilly
Charles Nelson Reilly was an American actor, comedian, director and drama teacher known for his comedic roles in theater, movies, children's television, animated cartoons, and as a panelist on the game show Match Game....
, ran until 1979 on CBS and another three years in first-run syndication until 1982, with a concurrent night-time version, Match Game PM, airing from 1975 to 1980. Rayburn was nominated for two Daytime Emmy Awards for Outstanding Host or Hostess in a Game or Audience Participation Show.
During the years when The Match Game was taped in Los Angeles, Rayburn lived in Osterville, Massachusetts
Osterville, Massachusetts
Osterville is one of the seven villages within the Town of Barnstable, Massachusetts. The village of Osterville is located on the south side of Barnstable on Nantucket Sound...
, on Cape Cod
Cape Cod
Cape Cod, often referred to locally as simply the Cape, is a cape in the easternmost portion of the state of Massachusetts, in the Northeastern United States...
, and would commute to California every two weeks to tape 12 shows over the course of a weekend (five daytime shows and one nighttime show per taping day).
In 1983, a year after the syndicated Match Game disappeared, the show was revived as part of the Match Game-Hollywood Squares Hour
Match Game-Hollywood Squares Hour
The Match Game-Hollywood Squares Hour is an American television game show that combined two long-running game shows of the 1960s and 1970s – Match Game and Hollywood Squares – into an hour-long format....
, with Rayburn hosting the Match Game segment and sitting on the panel of the Hollywood Squares
Hollywood Squares
Hollywood Squares is an American panel game show in which two contestants play tic-tac-toe to win cash and prizes. The "board" for the game is a 3 × 3 vertical stack of open-faced cubes, each occupied by a celebrity seated at a desk and facing the contestants...
segment. The show lasted nine months on NBC.
Perhaps one of the most famous Match Game moments came during a taping in 1974 when Rayburn unintentionally told a contestant, Karen Lesko, that she had "pretty nipples," meaning to say "dimples." The incident was cut from the original CBS episode.
He knitted socks as a publicity stunt during his time on Rayburn and Finch and later became avid in needlepoint, so much to the point that he would constantly do some in plane rides from New York
New York
New York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...
to Match Game tapings in Hollywood. In a 1974 Match Game episode, program packager Mark Goodson
Mark Goodson
Mark Goodson was an American television producer who specialized in game shows.-Life and early career:...
made a surprise visit to congratulate the host on making the show #1 among daytime television programs and Goodson gave Rayburn a needlepoint bag as a gift.
During his time in the Air Force, Rayburn was trained in meteorology
Meteorology
Meteorology is the interdisciplinary scientific study of the atmosphere. Studies in the field stretch back millennia, though significant progress in meteorology did not occur until the 18th century. The 19th century saw breakthroughs occur after observing networks developed across several countries...
and occasionally demonstrated his knowledge of the weather on Match Game.
Other game shows/television appearances
During and between his Match Game years, Rayburn served as guest panelist on two other GoodsonMark Goodson
Mark Goodson was an American television producer who specialized in game shows.-Life and early career:...
-Todman
Bill Todman
William S. "Bill" Todman was an American television producer born in New York City. He produced many of television's longest running shows with business partner Mark Goodson.-Early life:...
shows, What's My Line?
What's My Line?
What's My Line? is a panel game show which originally ran in the United States on the CBS Television Network from 1950 to 1967, with several international versions and subsequent U.S. revivals. The game tasked celebrity panelists with questioning contestants in order to determine their occupations....
and To Tell the Truth
To Tell the Truth
To Tell the Truth is an American television panel game show created by Bob Stewart and produced by Goodson-Todman Productions that has aired in various forms since 1956 both on networks and in syndication...
, where he exhibited the same inquisitiveness on serious subjects he showed on Match Game. Also during the run of the 1970s Match Game, Gene and wife Helen appeared on the game show Tattletales, hosted by Bert Convy
Bert Convy
Bernard Whalen "Bert" Convy was an Emmy Award winning American actor, singer, game show host and panelist known for his tenure as the host for Tattletales, Super Password, and Win, Lose or Draw.-Early life:...
. Gene was a long time host on NBC Radio's Monitor. Three years after the original Match Game was cancelled, Rayburn hosted the short-lived Heatter-Quigley Productions
Heatter-Quigley Productions
Heatter-Quigley Productions was an American television production company that was launched in 1960 by two former television writers, Merrill Heatter and Bob Quigley....
show, The Amateur's Guide to Love
Amateur's Guide to Love
The Amateur's Guide to Love was an American television game show, created by Merrill Heatter and Bob Quigley, that ran on CBS from March 27 to June 23, 1972...
(1972). He also hosted a pilot for Reg Grundy Productions
Reg Grundy Productions
Reg Grundy Productions was the American wing of the worldwide television production company Grundy Worldwide, which was founded by Australian television producer Reg Grundy. Reg Grundy Productions was responsible for the production of two highly-successful daytime game shows on NBC during the...
in 1983 called Party Line, which later became Bruce Forsyth's Hot Streak
Bruce Forsyth's Hot Streak
Bruce Forsyth's Hot Streak is an American television game show that aired on ABC from January 6 to April 4, 1986. British television personality Bruce Forsyth hosted the series, the only time he hosted a series outside of his native United Kingdom...
.
Rayburn appeared as a contestant during a tournament of game show hosts on the original version of Card Sharks
Card Sharks
Card Sharks is an American television game show created by Chester Feldman for Mark Goodson-Bill Todman Productions. Two contestants compete for control of a row of oversized playing cards by answering questions posed by the host and then guessing if the next card is higher or lower in value than...
in 1980 and was also an occasional celebrity guest on Password Plus for several weeks between 1980 and 1982.
Rayburn appeared on Fantasy Island
Fantasy Island
Fantasy Island is the title of two separate but related American fantasy television series, both originally airing on the ABC television network.-Original series:...
as a game-show host — he and another host were game show rivals who wanted to do the ultimate game show to win the woman they both loved; Roarke accommodated them with a game-show set, but the host's chair was more like a throne, and death was a real possibility. In the end, the two men, in a dead heat, were offered a final tie-breaker, a "sudden death" round.
Rayburn once hosted a local New York City-based show on WNEW-TV (now WNYW), Helluva Town, and in between game show stints in 1982-83, he returned to WNEW as host of a weekly local talk/lifestyles show called Saturday Morning Live. His tenure was brief when he ultimately accepted the hosting assignment for The Match Game/Hollywood Squares Hour.
The final game shows Rayburn emceed were 1985's Break the Bank
Break the Bank (1985)
Break the Bank is a game show created by Richard S. Kline. It aired for one season in syndication from September 16, 1985 to May 23, 1986 with repeats airing until September 12. It was not related to two previous shows by the same name....
, where Rayburn was fired after 13 weeks and replaced by Joe Farago
Joe Farago
Joe Farago is an American actor and television personality. He has appeared in at least 25 movies and television series, and replaced Gene Rayburn as the host of the 1985 game show Break the Bank, having previously appeared as a celebrity guest three times during the show's first two weeks.Farago...
, and The Movie Masters
The Movie Masters
The Movie Masters was an American television game show which ran from August 2, 1989 to January 19, 1990. It was the last game show hosted by Gene Rayburn and aired as filler programming on the American Movie Classics cable network....
, an AMC cable
Cable
A cable is two or more wires running side by side and bonded, twisted or braided together to form a single assembly. In mechanics cables, otherwise known as wire ropes, are used for lifting, hauling and towing or conveying force through tension. In electrical engineering cables are used to carry...
game show that ran from 1989 to 1990.
Right before production was to begin on a new Rayburn-emceed Match Game revival in 1985, an Entertainment Tonight
Entertainment Tonight
Entertainment Tonight is a daily tabloid television entertainment television news show that is syndicated by CBS Television Distribution throughout the United States, Canada and in many countries around the world. Linda Bell Blue is currently the program's executive producer...
reporter publicly disclosed his age, which was much older than many people believed. Rayburn had trouble finding jobs after that, blaming the reporter for disclosing his age and subjecting him to age discrimination
Ageism
Ageism, also called age discrimination is stereotyping of and discrimination against individuals or groups because of their age. It is a set of beliefs, attitudes, norms, and values used to justify age based prejudice, discrimination, and subordination...
.
Rayburn portrayed himself on a Saturday Night Live
Saturday Night Live
Saturday Night Live is a live American late-night television sketch comedy and variety show developed by Lorne Michaels and Dick Ebersol. The show premiered on NBC on October 11, 1975, under the original title of NBC's Saturday Night.The show's sketches often parody contemporary American culture...
sketch in 1990, which featured Susan Lucci
Susan Lucci
Susan Victoria Lucci is an American actress and entrepreneur, best known for portraying Erica Kane on the daytime drama All My Children. The character is considered an icon, and Lucci has been called "Daytime's Leading Lady" by TV Guide, with New York Times and Los Angeles Times citing her as the...
(as her character from All My Children
All My Children
All My Children is an American television soap opera that aired on ABC from January 5, 1970 to September 23, 2011. Created by Agnes Nixon, All My Children is set in Pine Valley, Pennsylvania, a fictitious suburb of Philadelphia. The show features Susan Lucci as Erica Kane, one of daytime's most...
, Erica Kane
Erica Kane
Erica Kane is a fictional character from the American daytime drama All My Children.The character has been portrayed by actress Susan Lucci since the show first aired in January 1970, until the last broadcast television episode aired in September 2011. Erica is considered to be the most popular...
). He returned as one of Kane's previous husbands (alluding to Erica Kane's many marriages during her stint on that show), stopping another marriage (officiated by his old "Choose Up Sides
Choose Up Sides
Choose Up Sides was a children's television game show that aired on NBC Saturday mornings from January 7 to March 31, 1956. It was hosted by Gene Rayburn and announced by Don Pardo and produced by Goodson-Todman Productions-NBC version:...
" co-star Don Pardo
Don Pardo
Dominick George "Don" Pardo is an American radio and television announcer. He is best known as the voice of the long-running late night sketch comedy show Saturday Night Live....
) with the host of a game show portrayed by Phil Hartman
Phil Hartman
Philip Edward "Phil" Hartman was a Canadian-American actor, comedian, screenwriter, and graphic artist. Born in Brantford, Ontario, Hartman and his family moved to the United States when he was 10...
. He also continued to make appearances on talk shows throughout the late 1980s and 1990s, usually to discuss classic game shows, including appearances on The Late Show with Ross Shafer
The Late Show (1986 TV series)
The Late Show is an American late-night talk show and the first series broadcast on the then-new Fox Network. Originally hosted by comic actress Joan Rivers, it first aired on October 9, 1986 under the title The Late Show Starring Joan Rivers...
(Shafer would host the ensuing Match Game revival when it premiered in 1990), Vicki!
Vicki Lawrence
Vicki Lawrence is an American actress, comedienne, and Billboard Hot 100 #1 singer, who was frequently a game show panelist in the 1970s and 1980s...
and The Maury Povich Show
Maury (TV series)
Maury is a syndicated American tabloid talk show hosted by Maury Povich.When the series first aired in 1991, the show was called The Maury Povich Show and was produced by MoPo Productions in association with Paramount Domestic Television...
.
Death
Rayburn's last TV appearance was a 1998 interview with Access HollywoodAccess Hollywood
Access Hollywood is a weekday television entertainment news program covering events and celebrities in the entertainment industry. It was created by former Entertainment Tonight executive producer Jim Van Messel, and is currently directed by Robert Silverstein. In previous years, Doug Dougherty and...
intended to coincide with the 25th anniversary of the CBS Match Game. Portions of the interview have been re-shown on the Game Show Network
Game Show Network
The Game Show Network is an American cable television and direct broadcast satellite channel dedicated to game shows and casino game shows. The channel was launched on December 1, 1994. Its current slogan is "The World Needs More Winners"...
which in 2001 showed portions of another previously unaired interview during the first airing of its Match Game Blankathon.
Rayburn died at his daughter Lynne Rayburn's Beverly, Massachusetts
Beverly, Massachusetts
Beverly is a city in Essex County, Massachusetts, United States. The population was 39,343 on , which differs by no more than several hundred from the 39,862 obtained in the 2000 census. A resort, residential and manufacturing community on the North Shore, Beverly includes Beverly Farms and Prides...
home of congestive heart failure
Congestive heart failure
Heart failure often called congestive heart failure is generally defined as the inability of the heart to supply sufficient blood flow to meet the needs of the body. Heart failure can cause a number of symptoms including shortness of breath, leg swelling, and exercise intolerance. The condition...
on November 29, 1999, one month after receiving a Lifetime Achievement award from the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences (Rayburn, though in very poor health at the time, arrived to accept the award himself). He was cremated and his ashes spread in the garden of his daughter's home.