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Though we're technically on hiatus here at Retroality.TV until sometime this spring, I wanted to take this opportunity to give a shout out to model-actress-singer-entrepeneur and now author Kathleen Bradley. The first black Barker's Beauty (1990-2000) just released her new tell-all book, Backstage at The Price is Right: Memoirs of a Barker Beauty -- and it is a sexy, eye-opening page-turner!
The African-American co-star of the hit 1995 movie Friday spills about her experiences behind-the-scenes at America's longest-running game show during Bob Barker's affair with prize model Dian Parkinson (1975-93), the blonde bombshell's subsequent exit and scandalous sexual harassment lawsuit against the legendary emcee, the host's costly and equally jaw-dropping legal battles with redheaded girl-next-door model Holly Hallstrom (1977-95) and the ensuing "fire"-storm that saw the contested dismissals of Bradley, longtime Price model Janice Pennington (1972-2000) and three other female staff members employed on the show for several years.
In her exposé -- which dares go where Bob Barker's 2009 memoir (the aptly named Priceless Memories) and the "official" Price tome (2007's Come on Down!) interestingly did not -- Kathleen kindly acknowledged interviews I've done with Holly and other Barker's Beauties for this site and elsewhere. (As many of you know, among the books I've been writing is my own Price is Right tell-all. I talk about this long-in-the-works project here.)
Bob Barker will almost certainly not like Bradley's book. The big question is: Will Bob Barker fans approach this with an open mind and give her story a well-deserved read? We'll see. Let the Plinko chips fall where they may!
(C'mon, Mr. Barker ... open up on all of this controversy. You deserve your say, as do the women of The Price is Right. The on-screen magic that you all -- yes, the entire oft-feuding Price family -- created during the show's hey days will forever flicker on YouTube and in the minds and hearts of game show fans.
A definitive history on the show will one day be published, and it is my sincere hope that it includes the memories and perspectives of Bob, Janice, Dian, Holly, Kathleen, original show model -turned-artist Anitra Ford and the show's other surviving key players/creative forces on camera and behind-the-scenes. Sadly, many important Price folk -- even some around well before L'Affaire Dian -- have been afraid or unable to comment given all of the litigation surrounding the show. But one day their voices will be heard, their faces seen and their contributions acknowledged -- just as they were by Bob Barker back in the good old days. How nice it would be for Bob to acknowledge them once more -- as Price did him on his 90th birthday, despite controversy in 2010 and 2012 -- and discuss the good, the bad and the, well, not so Beauty-ful, in a way that will bring the Price story full circle.)
Bradley's well-written, nicely-illustrated and hot-off-the-press memoir is available at KathleenBradley.TV. Soon, as per her just-posted promo video below, versions will be available at Amazon.com, too.
Buy a copy, heat up some Hot Pockets and get ready for some serious sizzle!
"Baywatch" babe Gena Lee Nolin tells Retroality's Chris Mann about her experiences as a TV sex symbol-turned-family gal with two "mommy-based" series and a book on postpartum depression in the works. The blonde beauty, 38, also reveals what it was like, at age 22, to replace original Barker's Beauty Dian Parkinson on "The Price is Right." And she spills on playing "Sheena" on TV, posing for "Playboy" and meeting '40s/'50s screen legend Jane Russell at the Hollywood Show autograph festival on Feb. 13-14. Gena gave this interview on day two of the convention. Part 1 of 2. For more info, see http://HollywoodShow.com and read Chris Mann's Los Angeles Times article about the event: http://shar.es/m1mvP
"Baywatch" babe Gena Lee Nolin tells Retroality's Chris Mann about her experiences as a TV sex symbol-turned-family gal with two "mommy-based" series and a book on postpartum depression in the works. The blonde beauty, 38, also reveals what it was like, at age 22, to replace original Barker's Beauty Dian Parkinson on "The Price is Right." And she spills on playing "Sheena" on TV, posing for "Playboy" and meeting '40s/'50s screen legend Jane Russell at the Hollywood Show autograph festival on Feb. 13-14. Gena gave this interview on day two of the convention. Part 2 of 2. For more info, see http://HollywoodShow.com and read Chris Mann's Los Angeles Times article about the event: http://shar.es/m1mvP
Six years ago on Oct. 27, 2003, colorful Price is Right announcer Rod Roddy lost his brave battle with colon and breast cancer at age 66.
The larger-than-life voice behind the immortal catch phrase "Come on down!" from 1986 until his death, Roddy was diagnosed with colon cancer on—of all days—Sept. 11, 2001. He soon became one of the first celebrities to publicly campaign for colon cancer awareness and early detection. Sadly, as his cancer spread despite chemotherapy, Roddy also became one of the first male celebrities to share his diagnosis, in March 2003, of breast cancer. (Recently, former KISS drummer Peter Criss and Shaft himself, actor Richard Roundtree, revealed their breast cancer diagnoses.)
"I could have prevented all this with a colonoscopy, and, of course, that's the campaign I've been on since I had the first surgery," Roddy told CBS months before his death. "To everybody out there, get a mammogram! It can happen to men, too."
Despite his two-year cancer fight, the flamboyant TV ham—famous for his vibrant, glittery blazers and wacky Showcase skits—remained committed to his 17-year gig as Price's famed on-screen announcer and host Bob Barker's TV sidekick. He showed up with bells on until his final hospitalization two months prior to his passing.
"We all admired his courage," Barker told an interviewer in 2003. "He was always upbeat and hopeful. I went to the hospital and sat on the edge of his bed and we laughed the whole time we were talking. He was still having fun."
But not nearly as much fun, another former Price colleague says, as Roddy would have wholeheartedly preferred. In 2002, the high-energy announcer was suddenly taken off camera on the iconic CBS game show. FremantleMedia, the show's production company, claimed Roddy's disembodied voice was the product of their new "international policy" to keep all announcers off camera on all of their shows. Despite his still robust appearance, Roddy was seldom seen on camera in his final year or so on the show. (During his absence for cancer treatment in late 2002, however, fill-in announcers Paul Boland and Burton Richardson were featured on screen when introduced by Barker. And Roddy made a brief appearance on camera during the season 32 premiere in 2003 when introduced by Fremantle exec Syd Vinnedge.)
Roddy's rare on-camera Price appearance, Fall 2003
This "policy" was a facade, says veteran Barker's Beauty prize model Holly Hallstrom. The 1977-95 show vet, who countersued the series' legendary emcee-turned-exec producer and won a multi-million-dollar settlement in 2005, claims Barker yanked Roddy off the screen in 2002 following a backstage dispute over money. According to Hallstrom, Roddy demanded higher pay for a series of successful Price primetime specials. She says Barker—not Fremantle—retaliated by taking away the very thing that kept the ailing announcer going: his coveted, if minimal, camera time.
For the first time ever, an emotional Hallstrom breaks her silence, in this Retroality.TV audio interview, about her "precious" co-star's reaction to his on-screen vanishing act while he fought for survival during the final year-plus of his life. (This segment of Hallstrom's explosive Retroality.TV interview—part 4 in an ongoing series of exclusive chats with the classic game show model—will be available next month on our You Tube channel).
Barker paid tribute to Roddy in an 18-second clip montage in a Price episode airing after the announcer's death. Howard Stern mocked this brief memorial on his popular radio show. CBS' Late Late Show aired a considerably longer video homage to Roddy—one of the talk show's favorite guests—around this time.
The Emmy-winning emcee never referred to Roddy again on his game show. Barker mentioned Roddy only once in his 2009 memoir Priceless Memories—while listing him alongside his Price predecessor, the legendary Johnny Olson, and Roddy's successor, Rich Fields (whose frequent on-camera appearances apparently signaled the reversal of Fremantle's international policy in the last five years). Olson and Fields earned the Price host's recognition in the book's anecdotes; Roddy did not.
Roddy's long and illustrious Hollywood career took off in 1977 when he was hired as the announcer for the hit ABC sitcom Soap, which ran until 1981. Prior to landing his "Come on down!" dream job, he enjoyed success at CBS as the "avoid-the-Whammy!" voice behind the high-rated daytime game show Press Your Luck. For more info about Roddy, visit friend and fellow announcer Randy West's website.
Forget legions of lawyers, publicists, focus groups, gossipmongers, news pundits, crisis management teams and Miss Cleo. CBS's King of Late Night need only look to CBS's former (and nine-times-sued) King of Daytime to see how NOT to navigate his first TV sex scandal.
Fifteen years ago, Mr. Come-on-Down himself, former Price is Right host and (since 1988) executive producer Bob Barker—then a mere 71 years old—shocked actual-retail-price-obsessed America when he copped to copping feels with one of his longtime and decades-younger prize models-cum-employees.
Days before fridge- and emcee-fondling Barker's Beauty Dian Parkinson—she of the itty bitty bikini who wound her hips so provocatively during "The Bump Game"—sued the game show deity for sexual harassment, Barker took control of his image (and public opinion) and broke the salacious news of afternoon delights-gone-wrong in a preemptive press conference. The longtime widower admitted to giving in to Parkinson's siren-like calls for "hanky panky," but vehemently denied that it was anything but her idea. "As God is my witness," he said all Scarlet O'Hara-like while raising his hand, "I have never forced her to do one thing that she did not want to do, ever, sexually or any other way, ever."
Never. Ever. Not even once during the Grocery Game. No way. Huh-uh.
Of course, then-49-year-old Parkinson disagreed, as was apparent in her jaw-dropping lawsuit claiming sexual harassment/employment discrimination, deprivation of rights under California constitution, intentional infliction of emotional distress, conspiracy and wrongful discharge in violation of public policy.
All because her boss agreed to play, um, Plinko and Pick-a-Pair in his dressing room. (Thank God that pricing games Flip Flop, It's in the Bag and Gas Money weren't created yet.) That was essentially Barker's way of seeing what he and other staffers called a consensual sexual relationship. Parkinson claimed he forced her to be a sex slave in order to keep her job between 1989 and 1993, when she finally departed ostensibly on her own terms. So, in June 1994, she sued him for $8 million.
(Letterman should appreciate these game show references. He's been a celeb guest on Password Plus, $20,000 Pyramid, The Gong Show and The Liar's Club, and he hosted the 1977 game show pilot The Riddlers. He also had a pre-litigious Parkinson on his talk show—as a mute but vivacious prize model—four times.)
But Barker refused to play Lucky $even (Figures). And after he publicly discredited the two-time Playboy cover girl over the next 11 months, she dropped her suit (her legal one this time), blaming health problems and financial depletion. Curiously, she never directly responded during Barker's media tour to clear his name while trashing hers. Parkinson testified that she'd taken "hush money" in exchange for "model consulting" payments when she "quit" the show. Evidently, she could speak out only in court filings and appearances, or through her attorneys. Score 1, Bob Barker.
The legendary host emerged, in the public's and media's eyes, as a victorious victim of a big-money shakedown. He also portrayed himself as the champion of legitimate sexual harassment claims—i.e., not those filed by allegedly scorned, come-hither game show models allegedly hoping to become the next Mrs. Bob Barker and/or very, very rich.
Barker seemed to have perfectly handled this potentially-devastating public scandal. In front of the camera, anyway. Behind the scenes, not so much.
Just when all seemed rosy in the silver-foxy world of TV's avuncular (?) emcee, another Barker's Beauty, Holly Hallstrom, was fired. Like Parkinson, this fan favorite had worked for Price for nearly two decades. Unlike "the lovely Dian," though, Hallstrom did not sign a hush clause but instead publicly spoke out, claiming she was forced out for being "too fat" and not defending Barker in the media—as her two fellow prize models had done—during Parkinson's suit. Viewers were aghast. Many angry Price fans wrote CBS and Barker. This time, Mr. Come-on-Down wasn't clearly in the victim seat, though he told Entertainment Tonight at the time, "I'm the victim here! I'm the victim!" It had become increasingly clear that Barker presided over a very hostile work environment.
Barker sued Hallstrom in 1995. She then held her own press conference and eventually countersued. Ten years later, after her dismissed case was successfully appealed, she won a settlement reportedly of at least $3 million. In 2000, shortly after his deposed and under-oath female staffers contradicted Barker's version of events surrounding Hallstrom's exit, Barker fired (or, according to him, didn't "rehire") five more female longtime employees. Two of the five—both of whom were very visible and articulate Barker's Beauties—received hefty settlements. The three behind-the-scenes female staffers sued for wrongful termination, discrimination and, in one case, sexual harassment. Two of these three women eventually received settlements; the other woman lost on appeal in 2007.
But wait. There's more.
In 2004, two African-American female employees sued Barker, his producer Phil Rossi, and the show for sexual harassment and racial discrimination. These two women—including future Deal or No Deal model and Celebrity Apprentice contestant Claudia Jordan—settled prior to trial. In 2007, a third African-American woman—this time a CBS employee—sued the host, the show and the network, alleging sexual harassment, racial discrimination and wrongful termination. Her case was recently thrown out but will, reportedly, be appealed.
Long story short, all of this very costly trouble likely could've been averted had Barker kept it in his pants. Certainly, lawsuits #2-#9 could've been avoided had Barker not—to borrow another CBS game show term—pressed his luck with his more outspoken and increasingly sympathetic female employees, the growingly suspicious public and the scandal-obsessed media, which circa 2000 included (non-CBS/Paramount-owned) shows such as E! True Hollywood Story.
Without further adieu (phew!), here are Retroality.TV's Top Ten Bob Barker-esque Things David Letterman Shouldn't Do During and After a TV Sex Scandal:
10. Don't defy CBS and (allegedly) give the female staffer you're secretly doing permission to pose nude for Playboy.
9. Stop letting women reach into your seemingly bottomless "$500 pocket."
8. Don't sleep with the chick despised by nearly ever other woman in the building.
7. Quit making women scream, "THAT'S TOO MUCH!"
6. Don't harass the gal who won't defend you publicly, then try to get her to "voluntarily retire" when she gains 14 lb. while taking hormone medication.
5. Don't call said gal—known for her klutzy bloopers—a "Big-Ass Ham®."
4. Stop hitting on women at "Barker's Bargain Bar."
3. Don't fire the lady who so publicly defended you during your first sex scandal if her testimony differs from yours during the lawsuit(s) spiraling out of said sex scandal
2. Don't tell ladies, "I'll show you what's behind 'Door No. 2' in exchange for what's in the box."
1. As God is your witness, never, ever utter the phrase "Come on down!"
