TV pioneer Reg Grundy started with one game show and built that into a global media empire
REG Grundy, the self-made media mogul, who died at home in Bermuda on Sunday, will be remembered as a major influence on Australian television — from producing local game shows in the ’60s to creating a global media empire.
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THE name Reg Grundy has become immortalised in Australian culture. The self-made media mogul, who died at home in Bermuda on Sunday, will be remembered as a major influence on Australian television, from producing local game shows in the ’60s to creating a global media empire.
In his early life Grundy made a living calling sports on radio but reinvented himself as a TV game show host, which became the springboard to a long media career, mostly behind the scenes but always as a familiar personality.
His legacy of TV credits included global hits such as Who Wants To Be A Millionaire, Neighbours and Prisoner, and Australian shows Blankety Blanks, The Restless Years, The Price Is Right and Family Feud.
Born in Sydney on August 4, 1923, he was the son of Hillier’s chocolate shop manager Roy Grundy and his wife, Lillian, a Hillier’s shop assistant. Roy rose to manage all of Hillier’s Sydney shops. Roy moved the family to South Australia to take up a job managing food halls for Myer in Adelaide. As a young boy Reg was accepted into the prestigious St Peter’s College in Hackney, where he discovered a talent for art.
In 1938 Roy moved the family back to Sydney where he became manager of the Grace Bros food hall. But the teenage Reg, not wanting to be a burden on his parents, left school and began an executive traineeship at David Jones. While there chairman Sir David Lloyd Jones called Grundy into his office and offered to pay his college fees at the highly regarded Julian Ashton Art School.
But in December 1941 he was called up for military service. Although he initially hated army life, and even went AWOL on one occasion when he felt homesick, he eventually settled in and was promoted to corporal in 1943. However, he developed a serious skin condition in 1944 and was given a desk job as paymaster at the District Finance Office at the Sydney Showground.
In his spare time he linked up with a jazz pianist friend Valdemar Smith to perform lunchtime concerts, doing songs and comedy. Thinking he might have a career in singing Grundy cut a record with Smith, but mates were not so encouraging. However, his announcements over the loudspeakers at the army base received favourable comments so he was encouraged to go into radio.
Discharged from the army in August 1946, he found a temporary job reporting from the 1947 Easter Show in Sydney for a country radio station. He was offered a permanent role after the temporary gig finished but decided to take recordings of his interviews to try to break into Sydney radio.
Despite being a sporting novice he eventually found a job with 2SM calling fights from Sydney Stadium, studying up on boxing terminology for the audition. In 1952 when the station was short of rugby league callers he put up his hand, this time studying up on player’s names and getting a friend, South Sydney player Jack Coyne, to help with calling the plays.
He later moved to 2CH where, in 1957, after moving on from sportscasting he came up with an idea for a game show called Wheel Of Fortune. It involved a host reading out questions to contestants who won an opportunity to spin a prize wheel.
It proved popular enough for Grundy to be emboldened to sell the idea to TCN9 boss Ken G. Hall. Grundy fronted the show as host, nearly freezing on the first program. However, he never felt completely comfortable on camera, so he took to producing game shows with his television production company the Reg Grundy Organisation, which he founded in 1959.
In the ’60s he copied American game show formats. When American producers approached him to pay for the rights, he bought rights to American shows, adapted them for Australian audiences and then sold them back to the US. He soon branched out into drama and in the ’70s began selling his shows overseas. Despite constant rejections he persisted until countries like the US and the UK bought shows such as Neighbours and Prisoner.
He was awarded an OBE for his contributions to TV and media in 1983. In 1995 he sold his media empire, then known as Grundy Television, for $384 million to Pearson Television (now Fremantle Media). He went into semi-retirement but occasionally dabbled in radio.
He is survived by wife Joy and his daughter Kim Grundy, from his first marriage to Lola Powell.
Originally published as TV pioneer Reg Grundy started with one game show and built that into a global media empire
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