Bob Barker died in 2023 at 99. He was America’s beloved game show host, the man who told contestants to “come on down” for 35 years, the animal rights activist who ended every episode of “The Price Is Right” with a reminder to have your pets spayed or neutered. He was also, per the E! docuseries “Dirty Rotten Scandals” and every person who worked with him and is now speaking on record, something considerably less warm off camera. Marc Summers, the former host of Nickelodeon’s “Double Dare,” described the allegations in the docuseries as “true and then some” and added that he could tell stories off the air that “make your hair curl.”
The specific Barker stories Summers chose to share on the record involve ego and compensation. The ego story: Barker’s dressing room door bore a sign reading “WGMC” — “World’s Greatest MC.” When Barker’s longtime colleague Bob Eubanks hid the sign as a prank, Barker “refused to go on until they find the board.” He would not host “The Price Is Right” without the sign confirming he was the world’s greatest MC. The compensation story: Summers wrote 50 questions for Barker when asked for 25, hoping to impress him. Barker left a check in the mailbox. It was made out to Marc Summers. It was for $50. “That’s the way it was,” Summers said.
The more serious allegations in “Dirty Rotten Scandals” come from Holly Hallstrom, one of “Barker’s Beauties,” who says she was fired in 1995 after refusing to publicly support Barker when model Dian Parkinson accused him of sexual harassment in a 1994 lawsuit. Barker’s stated reason for the firing was Hallstrom’s weight gain from medication. Hallstrom says she was told to appear on “The Suzanne Somers Show” and say Parkinson was lying. She says she refused to say that. She says she was on his “s–t list” after that. Two days before her case against Barker and CBS was scheduled to go to trial, CBS settled for a sum reportedly worth millions. Parkinson had dropped her own suit in 1995, citing emotional and financial strain.
Barker’s publicist called him “beloved” and “the greatest MC in TV history.” His longtime producer called the docuseries “an obvious hit piece” and said the show “was a happy place.” These are the defenses that arrive after a docuseries and a former colleague confirm the allegations were “true and then some.”
He hosted for 35 years. He paid $50 for 50 questions. He wouldn’t go on without the sign.
When a man who told America to have its pets spayed or neutered for 35 years is described by a colleague as having an ego that wouldn’t fit in the room, what exactly was the show about?
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