Origins
The decision to introduce Who Wants to Be a Millionaire to the United States was made by Michael Davies, a young British television producer who had earlier gained success in America by creating the game show Debt for Lifetime Television, and participating with Al Burton and Donnie Brainard in the creation of Win Ben Stein's Money for Comedy Central. At that time, the American Broadcasting Company (ABC) was in last place in the ratings indexes among U.S. broadcast networks, and the popularity of the game show genre was at an all-time nadir.
In 1998, Davies, then the head of ABC's little-noticed reality programming division (at a time when reality television had not yet become a phenomenon in America), decided to create a primetime game show that would save the network from collapse and revive interest in game shows. He heard about the development of the British Millionaire, got his family to record the show, and subsequently ended up receiving about eight FedEx packages from different family members, each containing a copy of Millionaire's first episode. Davies was so captivated by everything that he had seen and heard, from host Chris Tarrant's intimate involvement with the contestant to the show's lighting system and music tracks, that he chose to consider the idea of introducing the hit quiz show to American airwaves, convinced that it would become extraordinarily popular.
When Davies presented his ideas for the U.S. Millionaire to ABC, the network's executives initially rejected them, so he resigned his position there and became an independent producer. Determined to bring his idea for the show to fruition, Davies decided that he was betting his whole career on Millionaire's production, and the first move that he made was planning to attach a celebrity host to the show. Several personalities were considered for hosting positions on the show during its development, among them Bob Costas, Phil Donahue, and Peter Jennings. Then when morning television personality Regis Philbin saw an episode of the British Millionaire and was blown away by its content, Davies and his team ultimately settled on having him host the American show. When Davies approached ABC again after having hired Philbin, the network finally agreed to accept the U.S. Millionaire. With production now ready to begin, the team had only five months to finish developing the show and get it launched, with Davies demanding perfection in every element of Millionaire's production.
Read more about this topic: Who Wants To Be A Millionaire (U.S. Game Show)
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