Television Hall of Fame Inductees (Part 1)
by ethangentle | created - 11 Jun 2021 | updated - 16 Jun 2021 | PublicThe Television Hall of Fame is "a way to honour individuals who have made extraordinary contributions to U.S. television". Which one of these inductees is your favorite? Discuss Here in the IMDb Community Forums Hall of Fame Website
1. Lucille Ball
Actress | I Love Lucy
The woman who will always be remembered as the crazy, accident-prone, lovable Lucy Ricardo was born Lucille Desiree Ball on August 6, 1911 in Jamestown, New York, the daughter of Desiree Evelyn "DeDe" (Hunt) and Henry Durrell "Had" Ball. Her father died before she was four, and her mother worked ...
2. Milton Berle
Actor | It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World
Milton Berle was an American comedian and actor.
Berle's career as an entertainer spanned over 80 years, first in silent films and on stage as a child actor, then in radio, movies and television. As the host of NBC's Texaco Star Theatre (1948-55), he was the first major American television star and ...
3. Norman Lear
Producer | All in the Family
Norman Lear enjoyed a long career in television and film, political and social activism, and philanthropy.
Born in 1922 in New Haven, Connecticut, Lear flew 52 combat missions over Europe in World War II before beginning his television career. His classic shows of the 1970s and '80s - All in the ...
4. Carol Burnett
Soundtrack | The Carol Burnett Show
The entertainment world has enjoyed a six-decade love affair with comedienne/singer Carol Burnett. A peerless sketch performer and delightful, self-effacing personality who rightfully succeeded Lucille Ball as the carrot-topped "Queen of Television Comedy," it was Burnett's traumatic childhood that...
5. Sid Caesar
Actor | Grease
Comedian, saxophonist, composer, actor and musician, he performed within the orchestras of Charlie Spivak, Shep Fields and Claude Thornhill as saxophonist. Later, as super-hip jazz musician "Cool Cees" in television skits, he played tenor saxophone, and sang with the satirical trio "The Hair Cuts" ...
6. Rod Serling
Writer | The Twilight Zone
A former boxer, paratrooper and general all-around angry young man, Rod Serling was one of the radical new voices that made the "Golden Age" of television. Long before The Twilight Zone (1959), he was known for writing such high-quality scripts as "Patterns" and "Requiem for a Heavyweight," both ...
7. Ed Sullivan
Actor | Bye Bye Birdie
The beloved Impresario of TV variety from 1948 to 1971, Ed Sullivan originally made his name as a newspaper sportswriter, radio broadcaster and theater columnist for the New York Daily News. His column focused primarily on Broadway shows and juicy items about its stars. On the new medium of TV, ...
8. Steve Allen
Actor | Casino
Steve Allen was born on December 26, 1921 in New York City, New York, USA. He was a writer and actor, known for Casino (1995), The Player (1992) and College Confidential (1960). He was married to Jayne Meadows and Dorothy Goodman. He died on October 30, 2000 in Encino, Los Angeles, California, USA.
9. Walt Disney
Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs
Walter Elias Disney was born on December 5, 1901 in Chicago, Illinois, the son of Flora Disney (née Call) and Elias Disney, a Canadian-born farmer and businessperson. He had Irish, German, and English ancestry. Walt moved with his parents to Kansas City at age seven, where he spent the majority of ...
10. Jackie Gleason
Actor | The Hustler
Comedian, actor, composer and conductor, educated in New York public schools. He was a master of ceremonies in amateur shows, a carnival barker, daredevil driver and a disc jockey, and later a comedian in night clubs. By the mid-1950s he had turned to writing original music and recording a series ...
11. Mary Tyler Moore
Actress | Ordinary People
Mary Tyler Moore was born in Flatbush, Brooklyn, on December 29, 1936. Moore's family relocated to California when she was eight. Her childhood was troubled, due in part to her mother's alcoholism. The eldest of three siblings, she attended a Catholic high school and married upon her graduation, in...
12. Johnny Carson
Soundtrack | The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson
Johnny Carson, the legendary "King of Late Night TV" who dominated the medium's nether hours for three decades, was born in Corning, Iowa, but moved with his family to nearby Norfolk, Nebraska when he was eight years old. He was the son of Ruth E. (Hook) and Homer Lloyd "Kit" Carson, a manager of ...
13. Jim Henson
Soundtrack | The Muppet Show
Jim Henson never thought that he would make a name of himself in puppetry; it was merely a way of getting himself on television. The vehicle that achieved it was Sam and Friends (1955), a late-night puppet show that was on after the 11:00 news in Washington DC. It proved to be very popular and ...
14. Bob Hope
Actor | The Ghost Breakers
Comedian Bob Hope was born Leslie Townes Hope in Eltham, London, England, the fifth of seven sons of Avis (Townes), light opera singer, and William Henry Hope, a stonemason from Weston-super-Mare, Somerset. His maternal grandmother was Welsh. Hope moved to Bristol before emigrating with his parents...
15. Ernie Kovacs
Actor | Bell Book and Candle
Author, actor, comedian, composer and producer. He was educated at the New York School of Theatre, and received the Sylvania Television Award. Joining the American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers (ASCAP) in 1957, he composed a number of songs and themes, a number of which were used in ...
16. Jack Benny
Actor | The Jack Benny Program
The son of a saloon keeper, Jack Benny (born Benny Kubelsky) began to study the violin at the age six, and his "ineptness" at it, would later become his trademark (in reality, he was a very accomplished player). When given the opportunity to play in live theatre professionally, Benny quit school ...
17. George Burns
Actor | Oh, God!
George Burns was an American actor, comedian, singer, and published author. He formed a comedy duo with his wife Gracie Allen (1895-1964), and typically played the straight man to her zany roles. Following her death, Burns started appearing as a solo performer. He once won an Academy Award for Best...
18. Gracie Allen
Actress | A Damsel in Distress
Gracie Allen was born on July 26, 1895 in San Francisco, California, USA. She was an actress and writer, known for A Damsel in Distress (1937), The George Burns and Gracie Allen Show (1950) and The Gracie Allen Murder Case (1939). She was married to George Burns. She died on August 27, 1964 in ...
19. Red Skelton
Writer | The Red Skelton Show
The son of a former circus clown turned grocer and a cleaning woman, Red Skelton was introduced to show business at the age of seven by Ed Wynn, at a vaudeville show in Vincennes. At age 10, he left home to travel with a medicine show through the Midwest, and joined the vaudeville circuit at age 15....
20. Fred Astaire
Actor | The Towering Inferno
Fred Astaire was born in Omaha, Nebraska, to Johanna (Geilus) and Fritz Austerlitz, a brewer. Fred entered show business at age 5. He was successful both in vaudeville and on Broadway in partnership with his sister, Adele Astaire. After Adele retired to marry in 1932, Astaire headed to Hollywood. ...
21. Perry Como
Soundtrack | The Perry Como Show
In a singing (and sometimes acting) career that spanned over six decades, the name Perry Como has come to mean that warm, smooth, easy-listening, general-audience, slow-flame romance that characterized popular music in the 1940s, '50s and '60s. It has also come to represent an overall good feeling....
22. Carroll O'Connor
Actor | All in the Family
Carroll was born in Manhattan and raised in Forest Hills, a heavily Jewish community in New York City's borough of Queens. After graduating from high school in 1942, O'Connor joined the Merchant Marines and worked on ships in the Atlantic. In 1946, he enrolled at the University of Montana to study ...
23. Desi Arnaz
Producer | I Love Lucy
Desiderio Alberto Arnaz y de Acha III was born in Santiago, Cuba on March 2, 1917. His father was the mayor of Santiago. The 1933 revolution led by Fulgencio Batista had landed his father in jail and stripped the family of its wealth, property and power. His father was released because of the ...
24. James Garner
Actor | The Notebook
Amiable and handsome James Garner had obtained success in both films and television, often playing variations of the charming anti-hero/con-man persona he first developed in Maverick, the offbeat western TV series that shot him to stardom in the late 1950s.
James Garner was born James Scott ...
25. Andy Griffith
Actor | The Andy Griffith Show
Andy Griffith is best known for his starring roles in two very popular television series, The Andy Griffith Show (1960) and Matlock (1986). Griffith earned a degree in music from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. In the 1950s, he became a regular on The Ed Sullivan Show (1948) and ...
26. Sheldon Leonard
Producer | Make Room for Daddy
Sheldon Leonard was born in New York City's lower Manhattan, the son of Jewish parents. He studied acting at Syracuse University and, after graduating, landed a job on Wall Street. Following the Wall Street crash of 1929, he found himself unemployed and resolved to become a professional actor on ...
27. Dinah Shore
Soundtrack | The Dinah Shore Chevy Show
Her real name was Frances "Fanny" Rose Shore, and she was born in Winchester, Tennessee. Stricken with polio at 18 months of age, she recovered after receiving the Sister Kenny treatment. She became a cheerleader at Hume-Fogg High School in Nashville and went on to graduate from Vanderbilt ...
28. Dick Clark
Actor | Confessions of a Dangerous Mind
Dick Clark was born and raised in Mount Vernon, New York on November 30, 1929, to Julia Fuller (Barnard) and Richard Augustus Clark. He had one older brother, Bradley, who was killed in World War II. At the age of 16, Clark got his first job in the mailroom of WRUN, a radio station in Utica, New ...
29. Phil Donahue
Producer | Body of War
Phil Donahue is an American media personality, writer, film producer, and the creator and host of Donahue (1967). His television program, later known as Donahue, was the first talk show format that included audience participation. The show had a 29-year run on national television in America that ...
30. James L. Brooks
Writer | Broadcast News
James L. Brooks was born on May 9, 1940 in Brooklyn, New York, USA. He is a writer and producer, known for Broadcast News (1987), As Good as It Gets (1997) and Terms of Endearment (1983). He was previously married to Holly Holmberg Brooks and Marianne Catherine Morrissey.
31. Bob Newhart
Actor | Elf
Bob Newhart is an American actor and stand-up comedian. His comedic style involves deadpan delivery of dialogue, a slight stammer when talking, and comedic monologues. He has cited earlier comedians George Gobel (1919-1991), Ray Goulding (1922-1990), and Bob Elliott (1923-2016) as his main ...
32. Jack Webb
Writer | Dragnet
John Randolph Webb was born in Santa Monica, California, to Margaret (Smith) and Samuel Chester Webb. His father left home before he was born; Webb would never know him. He was raised by his mother and maternal grandmother in dire poverty that preceded the Depression. Making things worse, Webb ...
33. Alan Alda
Actor | M*A*S*H
Alan Alda (born under the name Alphonso Joseph D'Abruzzo) is an American actor, comedian, film director, and screenwriter from New York City. His father was the Italian-American actor Robert Alda. Alda's best known role was playing chief surgeon Benjamin Franklin "Hawkeye" Pierce in the ...
34. Oprah Winfrey
Producer | The Oprah Winfrey Show
Oprah Gail Winfrey , often known simply as Oprah, is an American talk show host, television producer, actress, author, and philanthropist. She is best known for her talk show, The Oprah Winfrey Show, broadcast from Chicago, which was the highest-rated television program of its kind in history and ...
35. Michael Landon
Actor | Little House on the Prairie
Michael Landon was born Eugene Maurice Orowitz, on Saturday, October 31st, 1936, in Forest Hills, Queens, New York. In 1941, he and his family moved to Collingswood, New Jersey.
When Eugene was in high school, he participated -- and did very well -- in track and field, especially javelin throwing, ...
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