Monty Hall, the genial host and co-creator of “Let’s Make a Deal,” the game show on which contestants in outlandish costumes shriek and leap at the chance to see if they will win the big prize or the booby prize behind doorNo. 3, died at his home in Beverly Hills, Calif., on Saturday. He was 96.
A daughter, Joanna Gleason, confirmed his death. She said the cause was heart failure.
“Let’s Make a Deal” had its premiere in late 1963 and, with some interruptions, has been a television phenomenon ever since.
When Mr. Hall first roamed among the audience members who filled the “trading floor” in an NBC studio in Burbank, Calif., there was nothing zany about them.
“They came to the show in the first week in suits and dresses,” Mr. Hall told The Los Angeles Times in 2013.
Within weeks, however, things had changed.
By one account, the turning point came when a woman in the audience, vying for Mr. Hall’s attention with hopes of being chosen as a contestant, wore a bizarre-looking hat.
Mr. Hall recalled it somewhat differently in 2013: The game changer, he said, was a woman carrying a sign that said, “Roses are red, violets are blue, I came here to deal with you.”
Whatever it was that opened the floodgates, would-be deal makers were soon showing up wearing live-bird hats, Tom Sawyer costumes or boxes resembling refrigerators. Some simply waved signs pleading, “Pick Me.”
“Let’s Make a Deal” became such a pop-culture phenomenon that it gave birth to a well-known brain-twister in probability, called “the Monty Hall Problem.” This thought experiment involves three doors, two goats and a coveted prize and leads to a counterintuitive solution.
Mr. Hall had his proud moments as well. In 1973 he received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. In 1988, Mr. Hall, who was born in Canada, was named to the Order of Canada by that country’s government in recognition of the millions he had raised for a host of charities. In 2013 he was presented with a lifetime achievement award at the Daytime Emmys.
Born in Winnipeg, Manitoba, on Aug. 25, 1921, Monte Halparin (he later changed the spelling of his first name and took the stage name Hall) was one of two sons of Maurice Halparin, a butcher, and the former Rose Rusen, a teacher.
He earned a bachelor’s degree in chemistry and zoology from the University of Manitoba. But, smitten by applause while appearing in college musicals, he moved to Toronto and began working as an actor and singer. In 1955 he moved again, this time to New York, where he became a regular on “Monitor,” a mix of comedy, music, sports and news on NBC Radio.
Five years later, Mr. Hall moved to Hollywood to host “Video Village,” a CBS TV show on which contestants played the role of “tokens” on a human-size game board. He teamed with the writer and producer Stefan Hatos to create “Let’s Make a Deal” in 1963.
Mr. Hall is survived by a show-business family: two daughters, Joanna Gleason, a Tony Award-winning actress, and Sharon Hall, a television executive; a son, Richard, a producer who won an Emmy for “The Amazing Race”; a brother, Robert Hall, a lawyer; and five grandchildren. His wife of almost 70 years, the former Marilyn Plottel, an Emmy Award-winning television producer, died in June.