PETER MARSHALL, R.I.P.

One of the most iconic game show hosts in history, Peter Marshall, the host of the original Hollywood Squares for the entire fifteen years of its run, passed away last week.

He might seem like an odd person for me to have had a show business connection with, but Peter and I had the same variety agent for many years. Industry insiders found it amusing that the guy who represented all the old school host types, such as Peter, also worked with my much younger and female self. It was quite the dichotomy, but I was proud to be included in the same stable as these men I had grown-up watching on TV.

With tongue a bit in cheek, I share with you that now I’ll never find-out if Peter Marshall ever forgave me for something that is possibly amusing to us. (It’s the only way for me to look at it, or else I’ll see red.)

A couple of decades ago, I was asked to host a new shopping television enterprise, The Panda Shopping Network. That genre is not my cup of tea, being all phony and all, but the producers promised me that they had a new take on how to present televised shopping to the world. They assured me that they wanted me to be exactly myself, as I was at the time on my cable show, Karen’s Restaurant Revue. The team chose me as the face of their channel, but we all knew that we needed a heavy-hitter to join me.

So I went to my agent, the fabulous Fred Wostbrook, and asked if any of his grown-up hosts would be interested in the gig. And to my surprise, the most famous and working one of those men, Peter Marshall, said yes! So we worked together for a few weeks, doing all that on-air nonsense. And then I noticed that I wasn’t receiving my checks. So I asked Fred if Peter was getting his pay, and it turned-out that he was not, either! He knew enough of the biz to get out immediately, but with big promises from the producers, they convinced me to stay. They even tried to make the entire presentation more like a talk show for me to host!

But it was still a nightmare, so I, too, quit, which forced the entire operation to go down. And I never received one dime for all my work. (I did somehow force them to pay my make-up artist, but that’s all I got done in the financial category. They didn’t even give me any of the merchandise I was selling for them! But meanwhile, Mr. X surprised me by buying two very expensive items of jewelry that he saw me “sell” on-air, and even paid shipping and handling! What a no-win endeavor that was in my crazy career.)

So, after that whole debacle, I was curious to know if Peter was angry at me for getting him into that predicament to begin with. I didn’t want to ever ask Fred what Peter’s feelings on it were, just to not bring-up what had to be an unpleasant memory for all of us concerned. But I’ve often wondered about it.

The last time I saw Peter Marshall was a dozen years ago. We were both in the small First Class area on a flight from LA to New York. Peter was sitting directly across the aisle from me. I re-introduced myself and reminded him that we were both represented by Fred, but I was loath to discuss our joint horrible experience with that show biz disaster.

By the way—it was wonderful to get to work with Peter Marshall! I would have never thought of that as a possibility previous to that experience.

I send my condolences to his family, friends, and fans, while acknowledging that we should all be so lucky to live such a long, (he lived to ninety-eight!,) and productive life.

R.I.P. Peter Marshall.