Kathie Lee Gifford
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Kathie Lee Gifford (born Kathryn Lee Epstein on August 16, 1953) is an American singer, songwriter, and actress, famous for her stint on the television talk show Live with Regis and Kathie Lee, which she co-hosted with Regis Philbin for 15 years.
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[edit] Early life
Kathie Lee Gifford was born in Paris, France to Aaron Leon Epstein and his wife, Joan. Her father was serving in the United States Navy. She grew up in Bowie, Maryland, in the United States. Her father was part Jewish and her mother was a Methodist; Gifford grew up in a culturally Jewish environment, but she became a born-again Christian at the age of 12 (after seeing a Christian education film directed by Billy Graham), although she still refers to herself as Jewish.[1]
Her brother, Rev. David Paul Epstein, is an evangelical Baptist preacher and pastor of Calvary Baptist Church on West 57th Street in Manhattan, New York City. David and Kathie Lee have remained close through the years.
Kathie Lee attended Oral Roberts University in Tulsa, Okla., studying drama and music.[citation needed]
[edit] 1970s
Gifford's career took off in the 1970s (during her first marriage to composer/arranger/producer/publisher Paul Johnson) as a vocalist on the game show Name That Tune with Tom Kennedy (she performed the "sing a tune" segment). In 1978, she joined the cast of the short-lived Hee Haw sitcom spinoff, Hee Haw Honeys.
Gifford appeared in television advertisements for Carnival Cruise Lines beginning in 1984. The ads were the first cruise line advertisements to air on network television.
[edit] Live with Regis and Kathie Lee
Following her divorce from Johnson in 1983, Gifford met sports commentator Frank Gifford during an episode of ABC's Good Morning America; the couple married in 1986.
By that time, she was several months into her most famous television role, as a full-time morning talk show personality. In 1985, she replaced Cyndy Garvey(and her successor, Ann Abernathy), as co-host of The Morning Show on WABC-TV with Regis Philbin. The chemistry between the two provided stability to a show that had gone through a series of titles and hosts (AM New York, The Stanley Siegel Show) during the previous decade. The program went into national broadcast in 1988, as Live with Regis and Kathie Lee (now Live with Regis and Kelly) and Gifford became well-known across the country. Throughout the 1990s, millions of morning-TV viewers watched her descriptions of life at home with her sportscaster husband and their two children: son Cody Newton Gifford (born in 1990) and Cassidy Erin Gifford (born in 1993), although Gifford has been gently ridiculed for constantly talking about her children on the air. She has appeared as a spokesperson for Slim Fast diet shakes after the birth of Cody.
The inspiration for the name Cody (the first born child) is when Kathy Lee was watching hubby Frank on a Monday Night Football game in 1989 featuring the Cleveland Browns and Chicago Bears (the Browns went on to win 27-7 with Webster Slaughter catching a 99-yard touchdown pass and therefore tying the NFL record). Cody Risen was an offensive lineman for the Browns and got much attention during the course of the contest because he was struggling with removing a piece of dirt or other foreign object from his eye that forced him to the sideline. The announcers kept on panning the camera over to Risen and the name Cody was indelibly etched on Kathie Lee's brain. This story was told dozens of times on the Regis And Kathie Lee show.
Gifford has stated that her religious faith has carried her through several personal crises.
In 1996, the National Labor Committee, a human rights group, reported that sweatshop labor was used to make clothes for the Kathie Lee line, sold at Wal-Mart.[1] The group reports that they uncovered her involvement when a worker in Honduras smuggled a clothing label out of the factory, which had a picture of Kathie Lee on it.[2] One of the workers, Wendy Diaz, came to the United States to testify about the conditions under which she worked. She commented that "I wish I could talk to [Kathy Lee]. If she's good, she will help us." [3]
Kathie Lee defended herself in a passionate response on the air during Live. Later, she appeared with President Clinton at the White House in support of U.S. Federal government initiatives to counter international sweat shop abuses.
In 1997, the tabloid The Globe, uncovered an affair between Frank Gifford and Trans World Airlines flight attendant Suzen Johnson. The incident was extremely embarassing to Kathie Lee.
[edit] Later career
About a year after The Globe uncovered the affair, the same tabloid published photographs of Kathie Lee's youngest child, Cassidy, next to a photo of child murder victim JonBenét Ramsey. The Globe selected photos in which the children were posed similarly, under a headline that announced that Kathie Lee was doing the "same" thing to her own daughter as Patsy Ramsey did to JonBenét. While some believe Patsy murdered her daughter, others believe that JonBenét's mother had somehow invited the murder upon her child. The title of the Globe article therefore suggests that Katie Lee's parenting was negligent.
In 2000, within two weeks of the Globe article, after 15 years as Philbin's sidekick, Gifford announced that she was leaving Live with Regis and Kathie Lee in order to protect her children, although she said nothing on the air about the latest attacks from tabloids on her family. Kelly Ripa replaced Kathie Lee as Philbin's Live co-host.
She has since made guest appearances in films and television series, and has several independently released albums on CD, including 2000's The Heart of a Woman, featuring music from the Big Band era as well as Contemporary Christian songs.
Since September 2005, Gifford is a special correspondent on The Insider, a syndicated entertainment magazine television show.
Kathie Lee also devotes time to Variety: The Children's Charity. She has also sponsored and supported two shelters in New York City for babies born with HIV or a congenital crack cocaine addiction. These shelters were named in honor of her children, Cody and Cassidy.
[edit] Trivia
In the second episode of South Park Kathie Lee comes to the South Park as Mr. Garrison's childhood rival. In the episode, Mr. Garrison tries to kill Kathie Lee, but ultimately fails. (Gifford did not provide her own voice; she was impersonated by a voice actor)
In a Season 3 episode of Hey Arnold!, Kathie Lee is parodied as Jackie Lee.
Kathie Lee and her husband, Frank, share the same birthdate, 23 years apart.
Kathie Lee Gifford will be appearing in "Annie" in NYC this holiday season.
[edit] External links
- Official website
- Kathie Lee Gifford discography (Music City)
- Gifford interview, 2004, The Christian Post
- Gifford interview transcript, Larry King Live, 2000
- Kathie Lee Gifford's clothing line and its connection to sweatshop work
Categories: Articles with unsourced statements | 1953 births | Living people | American actors | American female singers | American television talk show hosts | Christian actors | Hollywood Squares panelists | Infotainers | Jewish American actors | Jewish American singers | People from Paris | People from Maryland | That's So Raven actors | Seinfeld actors
