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Death of "Life" Host
Long before reality TV became a genre, Ralph Edwards found laughs and drama in real people.
Edwards, the creator and host of This is Your Life and Truth or Consequences, died in his sleep Wednesday at his home in West Hollywood, his production company announced. He was 92.
As a producer, Edwards helped spawn a generation of Judge Judys by encouraging small-claims litigants to settle their differences in The People's Court.
According to the Radio Hall of Fame, into which Edwards was inducted in 1995, the future TV pioneer began his broadcasting career at the age of 15. Before he was 30, he had dreamed up Truth or Consequences, a stunt game show that began its run on radio in 1940. With Edwards leading the way, Truth moved to network television in 1950. The show stayed on the air, moving from CBS to NBC along the way, until 1965. A syndicated version ran from 1964 to 1974.
Edwards' other signature show also had its roots in radio.
This is Your Life, wherein a celebrated guest would be surprised with glowing testimonials from friends, family and, occasionally, former teachers, first aired in 1948. The TV version debuted on NBC in 1952. For the next decade, the likes of Rock Hudson, Nat King Cole and Laurel & Hardy were feted.
Owing to the show's reality bent, not all of the surprises were happy ones. Lowell Thomas, famed for discovering and documenting T.E. Lawrence (aka Lawrence of Arabia) during World War I, was not at all pleased to find himself on Edwards' set. "This is a sinister conspiracy!" a quite serious Thomas announced on air, per Alex McNeil's Total Television.
Edwards revived This is Your Life for brief syndication runs in the 1970s and 1980s, ensuring that Bill Bixby and Chad Everett were paid proper tribute, too.
Regis Philbin recently was tapped to host an all-new This is Your Life for ABC. The network dubbed the property "the original reality show."
Together, This is Your Life and Truth or Consequences earned five Emmys.
The People's Court, which debuted in 1981, was the most successful of Edwards' behind-the-camera ventures. His producer's résumé also included the 1970s game show The Cross-Wits.
Edwards was born June 13, 1913, in Colorado.
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