Trivia

Wrote the 30-second piece of music heard during the "Final Jeopardy" category.

Not content with catering merely to the celebrity publicity mongers on his self-titled talk show, his unusually wide spectrum of guests ranged from superstars (Bette Davis, Joan Crawford, Orson Welles, Woody Allen and Richard Pryor) to the more controversial (Abbie Hoffman, Truman Capote, Gypsy Rose Lee and transsexual Christine Jorgensen), to the political mighty (Richard Nixon, Robert F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King).

His colt Stevie Wonderboy, named after Stevie Wonder, won the 2005 Breeders' Cup Juvenile.

Arnold Schwarzenegger made his talk show debut in the United States on Merv's talk show in 1974.

Longtime friends with Ronald Reagan, Nancy Reagan, Jane Wyman, Eva Gabor and Zsa Zsa Gabor. Best friends with Robert Loggia.

Declared 4F after failing several military physical exams during which a slight heart murmur was detected, the then-overweight Griffin took a job in the supply depot of a San Francisco shipyard to contribute to the World War II effort.

In the sitcom episode The Merv Griffin Show (1997), Kramer rescues Griffin's discarded set from a dumpster, and stages his own talk show in his apartment.

Over the years, he bought and sold more than 20 hotels, gaming resorts and riverboats, including Resorts International in Atlantic City and the Bahamas.

His Griffin Group included film and television production; a luxury home development in La Quinta; closed-circuit coverage of horse racing across the county; a real estate brokerage specializing in high-end residential properties; and a stable of thoroughbreds that included Stevie Wonderboy, the 2005 Breeders' Cup Juvenile winner at Belmont Park.

Although the divorced father of one son, Tony, and a constant companion to actress Eva Gabor over the years, it was generally known in the Hollywood circle that Griffin was gay. In 1991, the 65-year-old Griffin faced a multimillion-dollar palimony suit from former Griffin bodyguard and horse trainer Brent Plott, a 37-year-old who maintained he was Griffin's business consultant and lover and was entitled to a portion of Griffin's amassed fortune. That same year, Deney Terrio, host of "Dance Fever", filed an $11.3 sexual harassment lawsuit against Griffin. Both cases were thrown out.

His tombstone has engraved on it "I will NOT be right back after this message".

On July 18, 2007, Griffin was hospitalized for a recurrence of his prostate cancer.

KFRC billed him as "America's New Romantic Singing Star" in his early radio years. But at 5' 9" and 240 pounds, his romantic image on radio certainly did not fit his true look. After a female fan from Fresno dropped by the station to meet him in person and burst into laughter upon seeing him, Griffin went on a crash diet and dropped 80 pounds. Griffin would fight weight problems all his life. He admitted that he was a life-time smoker, ate whatever he wanted and hated to exercise.

Father of Tony Griffin.

Born in San Mateo, California, he took to the piano at age 4 and received lessons at a music conservatory in nearby San Francisco. In 1945, he heard about an audition for a piano player at KFRC radio but found out that they needed a singer instead and applied for that job. He got it and within a few days was hosting his own 15-minute radio show five days a week.

Actor Robert Loggia, with whom he appeared in the I Married a Princess (2005) episode "Kids Take Over", was his closest friend.

When Griffin rented a Beverly Hills mansion in 1975, he was surprised when busloads of tourists stopped in front of the house his first morning there - he assumed tour guides had already discovered he was the new tenant. He later found out that he had unknowingly rented the home in which Lana Turner's mobster boyfriend Johnny Stompanato had been murdered on April 4, 1958.

Especially close to Nancy Reagan and was a constant companion during President Reagan's battle with Alzheimer's disease. He was also there for her after the President's death.

Griffin is interred at Westwood Memorial Cemetery, adjacent to the final resting places of Billy Wilder, Jack Lemmon, Walter Matthau, Marilyn Monroe and Natalie Wood.

Received a lifetime achievement award from the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences (2005), and a similar award from the Museum of Television and Radio in New York.

When Phantom of the Rue Morgue (1954), a 3-D horror movie in which he had a minor role, bombed, Griffin decided he wanted out of his contract with Warner Brothers, under which he was being paid the relatively paltry sum of $250 a week. Studio head Jack Warner agreed to Merv's request, but demanded he pay $5,000 to be released by the studio. Griffin immediately wrote a check and handed it to Warner, but was secretly relieved when Warner tore up the check. "Let's face it," he later told friends, "I don't have $5,000 in the bank!".

Hit #101 on the Billboard 'Bubbling Under the Hot 100' Chart with "Banned in Boston" (Carlton 540) (1961).

Member of Tau Kappa Epsilon Fraternity.