Just started thinking about this today: who's run a game that later wrote a book?

(Note: the list includes everybody who wrote a book; whether or not the book had anything to do with game shows is not a consideration. And "author" in some cases is a reach -- I doubt Pat Sajak had a lot to do with the crossword books that bear his name.)

Feel free to add the names I've missed or forgotten.

Allen, Steve
Barker, Bob
Barris, Chuck
Bergeron, Tom
Carey, Drew
Carson, Johnny
Clooney, Nick
Collyer, Bud
Downs, Hugh
Enberg, Dick
Eubanks, Bob
Garagiola, Joe
Griffin, Merv
Hall, Monty
Ludden, Allen
Marshall, Peter
Martindale, Wink
Myerson, Bess
Pennington, Janice
Perry, Jim
Sajak, Pat
Trebek, Alex
White, Betty
White, Vanna

Former "Face the Music" host Ron Ely penned two mystery novels in the 90s.

Ex-"Lingo" host Michael Reagan has about a dozen books to his credit.

JD

Your definition of "author" seems to include those who actually wrote the words in their books and those who didn't (e.g. Bob Barker). I haven't read the books of most of these people, but I have to wonder which fall into the former category and which into the latter. I imagine Bud wrote the actual words in his books, but ISTR Merv's was "as told to Peter Barsocchini".

Gil Fates had a short-lived career as an emcee, and I read his and Monty's books during the summer of 1978. One year later I encountered both men face to face (it's fun to drop names!).

If I had remembered that [raise your hand if you remember the "CBS Television Quiz"], I'd have mentioned his WML? book [good reading, BTW!].

If we're also going to mention non-hosts, I guess I could throw out a good word for "J!" writer Harry Eisenberg's very detailed memoir on his years with the show.

Jack Bailey did a cookbook titled "What's Cookin'".

Jeff MacGregor wrote a book about a season of NASCAR racing.

Jamie Farr wrote an autobiography, but I'm reluctant to include him based on subhosting Wordplay.

I didn't included producers/production staff, otherwise Norm Blumenthal, Bob Noah, Les Roberts, and a few others would be added.

Damn you, I was wanting to get some actual work done today!

Jack Bailey
Wally Bruner
Walter Cronkite
Art Fleming
Jeff Foxworthy
Arlene Francis
John Reed King
Vicki Lawrence
Art Linkletter
Henry Morgan
Regis Philbin
Summer Sanders
Ben Stein

A lot of these really hit the margins of being an author. Bailey's was a cookbook, Bruner's a woodworking tie-in to his TV show, and King & Fleming both put their names on quiz books that they probably didn't write.

I strictly limited myself to people who hosted their own show, but if we cast a wider net (as you did with Janice and Vanna), then there are also people like Kitty Carlisle, Bennett Cerf and Orson Bean, to name only a few. For that matter, there are also Frank DeCaro and Billy Bean. (I'm pretty sure Jermaine Taylor was illiterate.)

Did every recipe call for liberal amounts of cooking sherry? (Sorry, cheap humor.)

Gil Fates wasn't a non-host strictly speaking. Ira Skutch is, but not Gil.

Did Ira Skutch write a book?

Howie Mandel has one coming out, called Here's The Deal: Don't Touch Me (slated to do a book signing in New York in early December).

Oh, goodness, yes. Quite a few, in fact.
My favorite of his was I Remember Television: A Memoir.
Published circa late 1980s/early 1990s.

Marc Summers wrote Everything in its place, about his dealings with OCD.

Ryan

1990, by The Scarecrow Press. Available from Amazon. This has more about his own experiences than any of the other books listed under his name likely would.

He wrote his memoir several years ago. I know and like Ira. He is THE most astute producer I've ever worked with -- I've worked with A LOT of people who call themselves producers -- and I learned a lot from him. Unfortunately, his memoir as written doesn't make for very riveting reading, I'm afraid. He talks about his days at Goodson-Todman but doesn't go into a whole lot of depth. He talks a lot about his days in the advertising industry and I had a hard time getting interested in it.

Gil Fates, the producer of What's My Line? from the beginning in 1950, wrote his memoir in 1978 but it was more about the show and the stars and is much more interesting reading. If you can find a copy, pick it up by all means. Interesting that Gil could craft such an interesting book out of such a simple show.

Though he is better known for other broadcasting ventures, Ed McMahon did host a couple of G-T shows. One of his books even had representative stills of his game shows.

Of course, the cheapest copy of this I've seen on either Amazon or Alibris (out-of-print books) is about $55 before postage; most go for $100 or more.

Happily, I paid about five bucks for my copy back in 1980 or so.

This from a review of Gil's book on Amazon.com:


Was Barbara Feldon the one who prematurely offered to take the place of D.K.?

The library is your friend :-)

Doesn't make sense to me. Get Smart! had been running less than two months when Kilgallen died, and was filming in Hollywood. Feldon had never done a game show at that point (other than The $64,000 Question as a contestant). I don't think G-T would have made that big a leap; the schedules likely wouldn't have meshed (Feldon would have been on planes most of the day Sunday and Monday, since WML? was still live), and I doubt NBC or CBS would have been very happy about the situation.

I'd never heard that, though I had heard the speculation about Bergen and Adams. Plus, "Line fans on Usenet" would pretty much be US back in the day, wouldn't it? I mean, there wasn't an alt.tv.whats-my-line. We never spoke of it as I remember, and a search in the old group doesn't turn up her name.

Feldon hadn't done the show (and wouldn't even be a mystery guest until 1973), so it sees even more out of place for her to have make an out-of-nowhere request like that. Finally, and probably most importantly, Get Smart had only been on the air for two months when Dorothy died, so Feldon was hardly "very large in television" at the time.

EDIT: Plus, you know, what Curt said.

Right, but is the reference to a "lady very large in television" on page 107 a reference to the person who offered to take the place of Kilgallen upon her passing? I agree, Feldon would not have qualified as such at the time.

It's on IMDB, but that doesn't mean it's accurate.

Surprised nobody said Jim McKay yet.

This is because no one felt like it, no one thought of it or we were saving it for you.
I'M surprised Randy West didn't mention himself yet.

I don't think it's so odd we might forget someone whose fame comes from some other venue, and whose game show hosting consists of only a handful of episodes.

Meanwhile...surprised nobody said William Shatner yet.

We're trying to forget.

Jack Paar.

He hosted two short-lived game shows in the early 50s: UP TO PAAR and BANK ON THE STARS. Before that, he briefly hosted TAKE IT OR LEAVE IT, the "$64 question" show on radio.

His books were:
I Kid You Not
My Saber is Bent
Three on a Toothbrush
P.S. Jack Paar: An Entertainment

In his first book, Jack recalled that during the time he was hosting the CBS MORNING SHOW around 1955, an advertising agency man had given him live commercial copy for a lipstick company that Jack rejected because he thought it was no good. He said that the sponsor dropped him from contention to be the host of a new quiz show they were starting that summer. The show turned out to be THE $64,000 QUESTION, and the sponsor, Revlon, became a household word.

I kid you not.

I'm not a host. And my legs have stood in the way of a career as hostess ;-)

Randy
tvrandywest.com

Especially that third leg.

How about Art Linkletter? How about Fred Allen?

Weakest Link hostess Anne Robinson's autobiography was titled Memoirs of an Unfit Mother.

You hosted Match Game 2007.
Plus, I believe the listings have opened up to include announcers, producers and such as.

Perhaps it was Totie Fields.

/Veal. Waitress. Make the Connection.

As long as you're not here all week.
I believe now as I believed when I first read The Holy Fates Scriptures that the letter came from Vivian Vance.

Art Linkletter's been mentioned. He had several books, including "Kids say the Darndest Things", a collection of bon mots from "House Party" that featured charming illustrations from no less than Charles M. Schulz.

Sam Levenson

I can't stand him. I blame him for the downfall of Two For The Money. Blah, blah, freakin' blah. Yeah, you're back. Big woo. Hit the road, boy.
Joan Rivers has written at least ten books.

All right, all right, I'm old enough to remember him, so I'll throw in Bergen Evans.

Has no one mentioned yet our old buddy "Kip" Fadiman? An egregious oversight if so.

And even though the book is a compilation of their sketches, they wrote them (which is probably more than some of the people on this list), so add Bob & Ray.

Egregious, indeed. Good ole Cliffy. Doesn't he have a birthday coming up?

Keefe Braselle sub-hosted "County Fair," "Dough Re-Mi" and Murray "Treasure Hunt." He was once a good friend of Jim "The Smiling Cobra" Aubrey and his book was a pulp novel about the television industry titled "The CanniBalS."

I'm VERY surprised that no mentioned (Dr.) Susan Stafford and her book "Stop the Wheel, I Want to Get Off". It's about why and how she went from game show hostess to humanitarian.

"Good friend" is an interesting way of putting it.

There's an extended quote from Jeff Kisseloff's The Box about Brasselle and Greg Garrison, the director of a short-lived variety show Brasselle hosted, that I'll have to dig up.

Keep your surprise to yourself. Best I can tell, that book doesn't exist. Even if it does somehow, it would have to be just about the most obscure thing on this entire thread.

Bless you, dear man.
I now add the name of Bill Cosby to our list.

SENTENCES THAT DRIVE DON HOWARD TO THE ARTILLERY CABINET? Right! ding ding ding ding

According to her website, the book will be released this year, but you can buy an advance copy from the site for $19.50.

OK, cool, thanks for finding that. Hopefully, it'll actually come out. I could still do without the "VERY surprised" comment from GSGuru about an obscure, unreleased book by a non-host.

/And I've met Stafford.
//She seemed nice.

Actually, it was supposed to have released last year:



That's a long wait -- I wonder if she didn't get a publisher. Self-publishing sounds appealing in theory, but you don't want to store a few thousand books in the garage.

Fixed that for you.

/nothing says "Look what tiny bit of obscure trivia *I* know!" like "I'm VERY surprised..."
//except for the utterly obsequious "Of course..."
///hi, Zach

That's what print-on-demand is for, yes?

POD's good for something printing 2,500 copies or less. Generally speaking, a book will go POD after it's gone through a regular printing or two and the publisher doesn't want to print 3,000 copies of a later printing and sell 300. If Susie only prints 2,500 copies of her book overall, it's probably not worth the work involved.

Well, I was thinking more along the lines of those online publishing houses that *only* do POD, like the one Donegan published his book through. Which I realize are horrible values for the author.