Philbin: Still the Excitable Boy.(Regis Philbin)(Interview)

By P.J. Bednarski

A Q&A with the host and his producer, Michael Gelman

Regis Philbin, at 76, still makes doing a live talk show look easy. And as Live begins its 20th season, Philbin and his executive producer, Michael Gelman, chatted with B&C 's P.J. Bednarski about longevity and why Live works so well.

Obviously, a lot of what you are today is based on what you learned a long time ago, when you were in L.A., as a sidekick on The Joey Bishop Show and even had your own failed late night talk show that you did for Westinghouse.

Philbin : The Westinghouse show. Boy, this is unusual to me to find a reporter who remembers that show.

I watched it. I remember watching the last show-

Philbin : Two-week tape delay [between when it taped and when it aired].

There was?

Philbin : Yeah. I came out of San Diego, where I had a live TV show on Saturday nights, and everything was great. And then they take me up to Hollywood [for the Westinghouse show] and then they tell me, you know, it's going to be a two-week tape delay. A two-week delay!

So how the hell can I talk about the Academy Awards or …