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Phil Donahue, dubbed “the king of daytime talk,” died Sunday.
He was 88.
Donahue, who spent nearly 30 years as a daytime talk show, paved the way for other, such as Oprah Winfrey, Montel Williams and Ellen DeGenere, per the Associated Press.
NBC’s “Today” show said Donahue died at his home after a long illness.
His family was with him, including his wife of 44 years, Marlo Thomas, his sister, his children, grandchildren and his golden retriever, Charlie, his family said in a statement to Today.
Donahue was the first to use audience participation in a talk show. He usually hosted one guest for an hour, typically during a full hour with a single guest, ABC News reported.
“Just one guest per show? No band?” he was often routinely asked and he wrote in his 1979 memoir, “Donahue, my own story.”
“The Phil Donahue Show” was a trendsetter in daytime television, and was popular with female audiences, the AP reported.
The show, which started in 1967 in Dayton, Ohio, was later named “Donahue.”
His first guest was atheist Madalyn Murray O’Hair.
Donahue did not shy away from controversial topics, such as feminism, homosexuality, consumer protection and civil rights.
The show was syndicated in 1970 and was shown on national television for the next 26 years. The show garnered 20 Emmy Awards. He also won a Peabody in 1980.
Part of the show included people calling in as Donahue would ask, “Is the caller there?”
The show’s last episode aired in 1996 in New York.
Donahue was living in New York with wife, actress Marlo Thomas, at the time of his death. The two were married in 1980. Donahue had five children — four sons and a daughter — from a previous marriage.
“It may have been a full three years before any of us began to understand that our program was something special,” Donahue wrote. “The show’s style had developed not by genius but by necessity. The familiar talk-show heads were not available to us in Dayton, Ohio. …The result was improvisation.”
Donahue also developed a partnership with Soviet journalist Vladimir Posner as the two discussed the Cold War in the 1980s.
Many took to X, formerly Twitter, to remember Donahue.
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