Larry King (born Lawrence Harvey Zeiger; November 19, 1933 – January 23, 2021) was an American television host, radio host, and paid spokesman, whose work was recognized with awards including two Peabodys, an Emmy award, and 10 Cable ACE Awards.

King began as a local Florida journalist and radio interviewer in the 1950s and 1960s, and gained prominence beginning in 1978 as host of The Larry King Show, an all-night nationwide call-in radio program heard on the Mutual Broadcasting System. From 1985 to 2010, he hosted the nightly interview television program Larry King Live on CNN. From 2012 to 2020, he hosted Larry King Now on Hulu and RT America. He continued to host Politicking with Larry King, a weekly political talk show which aired weekly on the same two channels from 2013 until his death.

Spouse(s)

• Freda Miller (m. 1952; ann. 1953)​
• Annette Kaye (m. 1961; div. 1961)​​​ 
• ​Alene Akins ​​(m. 1961; div. 1963)
• ​Mickey Sutphin ​​(m. 1963; div. 1967)​
• Alene Akins ( m. 1967; div. 1972)​​
• Sharon Lepore ​(m. 1976; div. 1983)​
• Julie Alexander ​(m. 1989; div. 1992)​
• Shawn Southwick ​(m. 1997; sep. 2019)

Early life and education

King was born in Brooklyn, New York, on November 19, 1933. He was one of two children of Jennie (Gitlitz), a garment worker who was born in Vilnius, Lithuania, and Aaron Zeiger, a restaurant owner and defense-plant worker who was born in Kolomyia, Austria-Hungary. His parents were Orthodox Jews.

King attended Lafayette High School, a public high school in Brooklyn. King's father died at 44 of a heart attack which resulted in his mother, brother and himself being supported by welfare. King was greatly affected by his father's death, and he lost interest in school.

Career

After graduating high school, Larry worked to help support his mother. From an early age, he desired to work in radio broadcasting.

Miami radio and television

A CBS staff announcer, whom King met by chance, suggested he go to Florida which was a growing media market with openings for inexperienced broadcasters. King went to Miami, and after initial setbacks, he gained his first job in radio. The manager of a small station, WAHR (now WMBM) in Miami Beach, hired him to clean up and perform miscellaneous tasks. When one of the station's announcers abruptly quit, King was put on the air. His first broadcast was on May 1, 1957, working as the disc jockey from 9 a.m. to noon. He also did two afternoon newscasts and a sportscast. He was paid $50 a week.

He acquired the name Larry King when the general manager, Marshall Simmonds, claimed that Zeiger was too ethnic and difficult to remember, so minutes before airtime, Larry chose the surname King, which he got from an advertisement in the Miami Herald for King's Wholesale Liquor. Within two years, he legally changed his name to Larry King.

He began to conduct interviews on a mid-morning show for WIOD, at Pumpernik's Restaurant in Miami Beach. He would interview whoever walked in. His first interview was with a waiter at the restaurant. Two days later, singer Bobby Darin, in Miami for a concert that evening, walked into Pumpernik's having heard King's radio show; Darin became King's first celebrity interview guest.

King's Miami radio show brought him local attention. A few years later, in May 1960, he hosted Miami Undercover, airing Sunday nights at 11:30 p.m. on WPST-TV Channel 10 (now WPLG). On the show, he moderated debates on important local issues of the day.

King credits his success on local television to the assistance of comedian Jackie Gleason, whose national television variety show was being taped in Miami Beach beginning in 1964. "That show really took off because Gleason came to Miami," King said in a 1996 interview he gave when inducted into the Broadcasters' Hall of Fame. "He did that show and stayed all night with me. We stayed till five in the morning. He didn't like the set, so we broke into the general manager's office and changed the set. Gleason changed the set, he changed the lighting, and he became like a mentor of mine."

During this period, WIOD gave King further exposure as a color commentator for the Miami Dolphins of the National Football League, during their 1970 season and most of their 1971 season. However, he was dismissed by both WIOD and television station WTVJ as a late-night radio host and sports commentator as of December 20, 1971, when he was arrested after being accused of grand larceny by a former business partner, Louis Wolfson. Other staffers covered the Dolphins' games into their 24–3 loss to Dallas in Super Bowl VI. King also lost his weekly column at the Miami Beach Sun newspaper. The charges were dropped. Eventually, King was rehired by WIOD. For several years during the 1970s, he hosted a sports talk-show called "Sports-a-la-King" that featured guests and callers.

National radio

On January 30, 1978, King went national on a nightly Mutual Broadcasting System coast-to-coast broadcast, inheriting the talk show slot that had begun with Herb Jepko in 1975, then followed by "Long John" Nebel in 1977, until his illness and death the following year. King's Mutual show rapidly developed a devoted audience.

The program was broadcast live Monday through Friday from midnight to 5:30 a.m. Eastern Time. King would interview a guest for the first 90 minutes, with callers asking questions that continued the interview for another 90 minutes. At 3 a.m., the Open Phone America segment began, where he allowed callers to discuss any topic they pleased with him, until the end of the program, when he expressed his own political opinions. Many stations in the western time zones carried the Open Phone America portion of the show live, followed by the guest interview on tape delay.

Some of King's regular callers used pseudonyms or were given nicknames by King, such as "The Numbers Guy", "The Chair", "The Portland Laugher," "The Miami Derelict," and "The Scandal Scooper". The show was successful, starting with relatively few affiliates and eventually growing to more than 500. King hosted the show until stepping down in 1994. King occasionally entertained the audience by telling amusing stories from his youth or early broadcasting career.

For its final year, the show was moved to afternoons. After King stepped down, Mutual gave the afternoon slot to David Brenner and Mutual's affiliates were given the option of carrying the audio of King's new CNN evening television program. After Westwood One dissolved Mutual in 1999, the radio simulcast of the CNN show continued until December 31, 2009.

CNN The Larry King Live CNN show began in June 1985 in which King hosted a broad range of guests from controversial figures of UFO conspiracy theories and alleged psychics, to prominent politicians and leading figures in the entertainment industry, often doing their first or only interview on breaking news stories on his show. After doing his CNN show from 9 to 10 p.m., King then traveled to the studios of the Mutual Broadcasting System to do his radio show, when both shows still aired.

Unlike many interviewers, King had a direct, non-confrontational approach. His reputation for asking easy, open-ended questions made him attractive to important figures who wanted to state their position while avoiding being challenged on contentious topics. King said that when interviewing authors, he did not read their books in advance, so that he would not know more than his audience. Throughout his career, King interviewed many of the leading figures of his time. According to CNN, King conducted more than 30,000 interviews in his career.

King also wrote a regular newspaper column in USA Today for almost 20 years, from shortly after that first national newspaper's debut in Baltimore-Washington in 1982 until September 2001. The column consisted of short "plugs, superlatives and dropped names" but was dropped when the newspaper redesigned its "Life" section. The column was resurrected in blog form in November 2008 and on Twitter in April 2009.

Departure

On June 29, 2010, King announced that after 25 years, he would be stepping down from his nightly job hosting Larry King Live. However, he stated that he would remain with CNN to host occasional specials. The announcement came in the wake of speculation that CNN had approached Piers Morgan, the British television personality and journalist, as King's primetime replacement, which was confirmed that September.

The final edition of Larry King Live aired on December 16, 2010, after a quarter-century. The show concluded with his last thoughts and a thank you to his audience for watching and supporting him over the years. The concluding words of Larry King on the show were, "I... I, I don't know what to say except to you, my audience, thank you. And instead of goodbye, how about so long."

On February 17, 2012, CNN announced that he would no longer host specials.

Ora TV Main articles: Larry King Now and Politicking with Larry King

In March 2012, King co-founded Ora TV, a production company, with Mexican business magnate Carlos Slim. On January 16, 2013, Ora TV celebrated their 100th episode of Larry King Now. In September 2017, King stated that he had no intention of ever retiring and expected to host his programs until he died.

Ora TV signed a multi-year deal with Hulu to exclusively carry King's new talk-oriented web series, Larry King Now, beginning July 17. On October 23, 2012, King hosted the third-party presidential debate on Ora TV, featuring Jill Stein, Rocky Anderson, Virgil Goode, and Gary Johnson.

In May 2013, the Russian-owned RT America network announced that they struck a deal with Ora TV to host the Larry King Now show on its network. King said in an advertisement on RT America: "I would rather ask questions to people in positions of power, instead of speaking on their behalf." The show continued to be available on Hulu.com and Ora.tv. The following month, RT America began airing Larry King's new Thursday evening political talk show Politicking with Larry King, beginning with a discussion between Representative Aaron Schock (R, Illinois), Democratic Political Strategist Peter Fenn and Politico's Deputy Managing Editor Rachel Smolkin about Edward Snowden's leak scandal that revealed secret NSA surveillance programs.

When criticized for doing business with a Russian-owned TV network in 2014, King responded, "I don't work for RT", commenting that his podcasts, Larry King Now and Politicking, are licensed for a fee to RT America by New York-based Ora TV. "It’s a deal made between the companies ... They just license our shows. If they took something out, I would never do it. It would be bad if they tried to edit out things. I wouldn’t put up with it."

Other ventures

Larry King remained active as a writer and television personality. King was the moderator of the sixth Kazenergy Eurasian Forum in Astana, Kazakhstan, an annual forum for Kazakhstan's energy sector occurring in October 2011.

King guest starred in episodes of Arthur, 30 Rock and Gravity Falls, had cameos in Ghostbusters and Bee Movie, and voiced Doris the Ugly Stepsister in Shrek 2 and its sequels. He also played himself in The People v. O. J. Simpson: American Crime Story and appeared as himself in an episode of Law and Order: Trial by Jury.

King hosted the educational television series In View with Larry King from 2013 to 2015, which was carried on cable television networks including Fox Business Network and Discovery and produced by The Profiles Series production company.

King made an appearance alongside his wife, Shawn King, on October 8 edition of WWE Monday Night Raw and participated in a segment with The Miz and Kofi Kingston. He had served as Raw's Social Media Ambassador the previous week.

King became a very active user on the social-networking site Twitter, where he posted thoughts and commented on a wide variety of subjects. King stated, "I love tweeting, I think it's a different world we've entered. When people were calling in, they were calling in to the show and now on Twitter I'm giving out thoughts, opinions. The whole concept has changed."

After 2011, he also made various TV infomercials, often appearing as a "host" discussing products like Omega-3 fatty acid dietary supplement OmegaXL with guests, in an interview style reminiscent of his past TV programs.

Charitable works

After his 1987 heart attack, King founded the Larry King Cardiac Foundation, which paid for life-saving cardiac procedures for people who otherwise would not be able to afford them.

On August 30, 2010, King served as the host of Chabad's 30th annual "To Life" telethon, in Los Angeles.

He donated to the Beverly Hills 9/11 Memorial Garden, and his name is on the monument.

Controversies

On September 10, 1990, while on The Joan Rivers Show, Rivers asked King which contestant in the Miss America pageant was "the ugliest." King responded, "Miss Pennsylvania. She was one of the 10 finalists and she did a great ventriloquist bit ... The dummy was prettier." King was a judge for the September 8, 1990 pageant. King later sent Miss Pennsylvania, Marla Wynne, a dozen long-stemmed roses and a telegram apologizing for his remarks.

In 1997, King was one of 34 celebrities to sign an open letter to then-German Chancellor Helmut Kohl, published as a newspaper advertisement in the International Herald Tribune, which protested the treatment of Scientologists in Germany, comparing it to the Nazis' oppression of Jews in the 1930s. Other signatories included Dustin Hoffman and Goldie Hawn.

In 2019, King was asked by Jacobi Niv, a friend who had in the past arranged for King to film various infomercials and promotional videos to film what King was told would be a conference video. Niv gave King a list of scripted questions to read. These were later edited into a video of comments by Russian journalist Anastasia Dolgova on the topic of Guo Wengui, whom Dolgova alleged had committed a number of crimes. The video was edited to give the appearance of King and Dolgova having a live conversation; however, the questions and answers were recorded separately and King, reading a script, was unaware of her responses, which repeated the line of the Chinese government on the issue. Once King's own production company saw the completed video, they refused to post it online and asked that it not be released. Niv disregarded their objections and released the video independently on YouTube. King's family insisted that it be removed but once Niv took it down he found that it had been duplicated and gone viral on Twitter due to the efforts of what ProPublica alleges are Chinese government–run social media accounts. As a result of the incident, King severed his relationship with Niv, saying he believed Niv took advantage of their friendship.

Personal life

King was married eight times, to seven women. He married high-school sweetheart Freda Miller in 1952 at age 19. That union ended the following year at the behest of their parents, who reportedly had the marriage annulled. King was later briefly married to Annette Kaye, who gave birth to his son, Larry Jr., in November 1961. King did not meet Larry Jr. until the latter was in his thirties.

In 1961, King married his third wife, Alene Akins, a Playboy Bunny, at one of the magazine's eponymous nightclubs. King adopted Akins' son Andy in 1962; the couple divorced the following year. In 1963, King married his fourth wife, Mary Francis "Mickey" Stuphin, who divorced King. He remarried Akins, with whom he had a second child, Chaia, in 1969. The couple divorced a second time in 1972. In 1997, Dove Books published a book written by King and Chaia, Daddy Day, Daughter Day. Aimed at young children, it tells each of their accounts of his divorce from Akins.

On September 25, 1976, King married his fifth wife, mathematics teacher and production assistant Sharon Lepore. The couple divorced in 1983.

King met businesswoman Julie Alexander in 1989, and proposed to her on the couple's first date on August 1, 1989. Alexander became King's sixth wife on October 7, 1989, when the two were married in Washington, D.C. The couple lived in different cities, however, with Alexander in Philadelphia, and King in Washington, D.C., where he worked. They separated in 1990 and divorced in 1992. He became engaged to actress Deanna Lund in 1995, after five weeks of dating, but they remained unmarried.

In 1997, he married his seventh wife, Shawn Southwick, born in 1959 (as Shawn Ora Engemann), a singer, actress, and TV host. They wed in King's Los Angeles hospital room three days before King underwent heart surgery to clear a clogged blood vessel. The couple had two children: Chance, born March 1999, and Cannon, born May 2000. He was stepfather to Arena Football League quarterback Danny Southwick. On King and Southwick's 10th anniversary in September 2007, Southwick joked she was "the only [wife] to have lasted into the two digits". Larry and Shawn King filed for divorce in 2010 but reconciled, and filed for divorce again on August 20, 2019.

King resided in Beverly Hills, California. A lifelong Brooklyn Dodgers/Los Angeles Dodgers fan, King was frequently seen behind home plate at the team's games. King was previously part of an investment group that attempted to bring a Major League Baseball franchise to Buffalo, New York in 1990.

From his seven wives, King had five children and nine grandchildren, as well as four great-grandchildren. Both of his children with Alene, Andy and Chaia, died within weeks of each other in August 2020, Andy at 65 from a heart attack and Chaia at 51 from lung cancer.

King was a Jewish agnostic.

Heart disease

On February 24, 1987, King suffered a major heart attack and then had successful quintuple-bypass surgery.[37][99] Following this, King wrote two books about living with heart disease. Mr. King, You're Having a Heart Attack: How a Heart Attack and Bypass Surgery Changed My Life (1989, ISBN 0-440-50039-7) was written with New York's Newsday science editor B. D. Colen. Taking On Heart Disease: Famous Personalities Recall How They Triumphed over the Nation's #1 Killer and How You Can, Too (2004, ISBN 1-57954-820-2) features the experience of various celebrities with cardiovascular disease including Peggy Fleming and Regis Philbin.

King related his heart attack experience in a film interview in the 2014 British documentary film The Widowmaker which discusses cardiology diagnostic tests.

King had received annual chest X-rays to monitor his heart condition. During his 2017 examination, doctors discovered a cancerous tumor in his lung. It was successfully removed with surgery.

On April 23, 2019, King underwent a scheduled angioplasty and also had stents inserted. It was erroneously reported that he had suffered another heart attack along with heart failure; these claims were later retracted. He returned to Politicking with Larry King on August 15, 2019.

On November 27, 2019, King revealed he had suffered a stroke in March 2019, and was in a coma “for weeks”. He later admitted he had contemplated suicide following the stroke, telling Los Angeles television station KTLA, "I thought I was just going to bite the bullet. I didn't want to live this way."

Illness and death

On January 2, 2021, it was revealed that King had been hospitalized 10 days earlier in a Los Angeles hospital after testing positive for COVID-19.

On January 23, 2021, King died at the age of 87 at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles.

Awards and nominations

King received many broadcasting awards. He won the Peabody Award for Excellence in broadcasting for both his radio (1982) and television (1992) shows. He also won 10 CableACE awards for Best Interviewer and for Best Talk Show Series.

In 1989, King was inducted into the National Radio Hall of Fame, and in 1996 to the Broadcasters' Hall of Fame. In 2002, the industry publication Talkers Magazine named King both the fourth-greatest radio talk show host of all time and the top television talk show host of all time.

In 1994, King received the Scopus Award from the American Friends of Hebrew University. In 1996, he received the Golden Plate Award of the American Academy of Achievement presented by Awards Council member Art Buchwald. In June 1998, he received an honorary degree from Brooklyn College, City University of New York, for his life achievements.

He was given the Golden Mike Award for Lifetime Achievement in January 2008, by the Radio & Television News Association of Southern California.

King was an honorary member of the Rotary Club of Beverly Hills. He was also a recipient of the President's Award honoring his impact on media from the Los Angeles Press Club in 2006.

King was the first recipient of the Arizona State University Hugh Downs Award for Communication Excellence, presented April 11, 2007, via satellite by Downs himself.

King was awarded an honorary degree of Doctor of Humane Letters by Bradley University; for which he said "is really a hoot." King has received numerous honorary degrees from institutions as George Washington University, the Columbia School of Medicine, among others.

In 2003, King was named as recipient of the Snuffed Candle Award by the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry's Council for Media Integrity. King received this award for '"encouraging credulity (and) presenting pseudoscience as genuine'".

Legacy

In July 2009 and again on February 2014, King appeared on The Tonight Show with Conan O'Brien and on Conan respectively, where he told O'Brien about his wishes to be cryonically preserved upon death, as he had revealed in his book My Remarkable Journey. In December 2011, preceding a CNN Special on the topic, the Kings had a special dinner with friends Conan O'Brien, Tyra Banks, Shaquille O'Neal, Seth MacFarlane, Jack Dorsey, Quincy Jones, and Russell Brand where his intent to do so was reiterated, among other topics that were discussed.

King stated that his interest in cryonics was partly due to not believing in an afterlife or a higher power. King said that he was an atheist, and that he doubted religious claims, in part because of human suffering from natural disasters like Hurricane Katrina.

When asked what he would like his legacy to be, King, referring to himself, said, "His life led to more people having information that they didn't have before, and he taught us a lot and we learned a lot and enjoyed it at the same time. He brought a great deal of pride to his business."