Larry King: Veteran US Talk Show Host Dies Aged 87

Larry King is said to anchor an estimated figure of 50,000 interviews throughout his career, which lasted for more than 60 years. CNN talk show, Larry King Live is also hosted by the Journalism legend, an outstanding show which lasted for 25 years.

He gave up the ghost at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, reported by the production company he co-founded, Ora media.

According to US media, the TV star was treated for Covid-19 in the early days of January.

Larry King, the talk show host, who was well known for his braces and rolled-up sleeves, encountered numerous health challenges in recent years, with various heart attacks.

The TV star tied the knot eight times to seven women and birthed five kids. Sadly, two of his kids died last year within weeks of each other, Chaia, his daughter, died of lung cancer, and his son Andy died of a heart attack.

One of his outstanding record as a TV host is interviewing every sitting US President from Gerald Ford to Barrack Obama and a good number of world leaders. Larry King also interviewed other well-known personalities like Dr. Martin Luther King, the Dalai Lama, Nelson Mandel, and Lady Gaga.

“For 63 years and across the platforms of radio, television and digital media, Larry’s many thousands of interviews, awards, and global acclaim stand as a testament to his unique and lasting talent as a broadcaster,” Ora Media expresses in a public article, without giving the cause of death.

King was born in 1933, and his radio program “The Larry King Show,” on the commercial network of Mutual Broadcasting System, played a role in his rise to fame in the 1970s.

In 1985, Larry King initiated Larry King live on the fledgling CNN and became one of the network’s greatest stars. The program was broadcasted universally and reach considerable recognition with the audiences, with thousands of calls from viewers.

The TV figure received many honors and universal recognition like the Peabody awards, but he was not excluded from criticism for his non-confrontational approach and open-ended questions. 

King bragged that he doesn’t go deep with his research ahead of his interviews so he could learn along with viewers. “I like spontaneity. That’s the kind of broadcaster I am,” he said.

His ratings reduce drastically in 2010, with his critics claiming that King’s approach is outdated in an epoch of more contentious interviewing methods.

Larry King publicized his retirement, saying, “It’s time to hang up my nightly suspenders.”

Larry King’s last show on CNN, he told his audiences, “I don’t know what to say, except to you, my audience, thank you. Instead of goodbye, how about so long?”

In a statement released by the CNN President, Jeff Zucker said: “The scrappy young man from Brooklyn had a history-making career spanning radio and television. His curiosity about the world propelled his award-winning career in broadcasting, but it was his generosity of spirit that drew the world to him.”