Les Crane, a talk radio innovator and Grammy winner remembered as the first television host to take on Johnny Carson, died on July 13. He was 74.
Crane died of natural causes at Marin General Hospital in Greenbrae just north of San Francisco, said his daughter, Caprice Crane.
Born in New York, Crane gained attention as a raconteur in the early 1960s while hosting a talk radio show out of a San Francisco nightclub frequented by hipster comedians like Mort Sahl and Lenny Bruce.
His rapid-fire, opinionated style and sometimes confrontational handling of callers — unusual at the time — drew the attention of his radio station’s parent company, ABC, which tapped him as a late-night talk-show host for its local television affiliate in New York.
In 1964, Crane landed the first United States television interview with the Rolling Stones, and months later the network slotted him against Carson, who had started hosting The Tonight Show on NBC two years earlier. The Les Crane Show lasted only a few months.
During his time as a television host, Crane gained a reputation for his provocative guests, including Malcolm X and gay activist Randy Wicker. He interviewed a young Bob Dylan and became known for aiming a microphone at audience members to let them question the show’s guests.
Crane won a best spoken-word Grammy for his 1971 recording of Desiderata, an inspirational prose poem embraced by the 1960s counterculture. Casey Kasem also credited Crane in a 1990 interview with helping to develop the Top 40 countdown of most popular songs.
Crane graduated from Tulane University and served as a pilot and flight instructor in the US air force before becoming an entertainer.
Later in life, Crane became a successful software publisher in the budding personal computer industry with his company The Software Toolworks, which he took public in 1988.
Crane was married five times. His ex-wife Tina Louise is best known for her role as Ginger on the television comedy show Gilligan’s Island. Crane and Louise had one daughter, Caprice, a television writer and novelist in Los Angeles.
Crane is survived by his daughter and wife of 20 years, Ginger Crane. – Sapa-AP