Alan Thicke

Alan Thicke
Alan Thicke in 2003.
Born	Alan Willis Jeffery March 1, 1947 (1947-03-01) (age 62) Kirkland Lake, Ontario, Canada
Occupation	Actor, songwriter, composer, game show host, talk-show emcee
Years active	1969–present
Spouse(s)	Gloria Loring (1970-1983) Gina Tolleson (1994-1999) Tanya Callau (2005-present)

Alan Willis Jeffery (born March 1, 1947), better known as Alan Thicke, is a Canadian actor, songwriter, and game and talk show host. He is best known for his role as Jason Seaver, the patriarch on the ABC television series Growing Pains.

Background and personal life

Thicke was born in Kirkland Lake, Ontario, the son of Joan, a nurse, and William Jeffrey, a stockbroker.^[1] His mother later married Brian Thicke, a physician. He graduated from Elliot Lake secondary school in 1965, and was elected the homecoming king.^[2] He went on to attend the University of Western Ontario, where he joined the Delta Upsilon fraternity. Alan is an avid ice hockey and softball fan/player.

Thicke has been married three times. His first marriage to Days of our Lives actress Gloria Loring, from 1970 to 1983, bore him two sons, Brennan and Robin.^[1] His second marriage was to the Miss World 1990 pageant winner, Gina Tolleson, from 1992 to 1999, and produced a third son, Carter Willam.^[1] He has been married to Tanya Callau since 2005.^[2]

His son Robin is a platinum album-selling musician, and his son Brennan was a voice actor for cartoons when he was younger.

Game shows

Thicke hosted a Canadian game show on CFCF-TV in Montreal called First Impressions in the late 1970s and the prime time celebrity game show Animal Crack-Ups in the late 1980s. In 1997, he hosted a television version of the board game Pictionary.^[1] In the early 2000s, he hosted the All New 3's a Crowd on the Game Show Network.^[1]

Talk shows

Norman Lear hired Thicke to produce and head the writing staff of Fernwood 2-Night, a tongue-in-cheek talk show based on characters from Lear's earlier show, Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman.

Thicke was also the host of his own popular talk show in Canada during the early 1980s, called the The Alan Thicke Show. The show at one point spawned a prime time spin-off titled Prime Cuts, which consisted of edited highlights from the talk show.

Based on the success of his talk show, Thicke was signed to do an American late night talk show Thicke of the Night.

Theme song composer

Thicke had a successful career as a TV theme song composer. He often collaborated with his wife Gloria Loring on these projects, which included the themes to the popular sitcoms Diff'rent Strokes and The Facts of Life. He also wrote a number of TV game show themes, including The Wizard of Odds (for which he also sang the vocal introduction), The Joker's Wild, Celebrity Sweepstakes, The Diamond Head Game, Blank Check, Whew! and the original theme to Wheel of Fortune.

Television and film appearances

Apart from Growing Pains, Thicke also appeared on the American television series Hope & Gloria, which lasted 35 episodes. In 2004, Thicke hosted the Miss Universe Canada pageant.^[2] In April 2006, he hosted Celebrity Cooking Showdown on NBC, in which celebrities were teamed with famous chefs in a cooking competition.^[2]

In August 2006 and 2007, Thicke made a few appearances as talk show host Rich Ginger on The Bold and the Beautiful.^[2] Thicke also had a cameo appearance in the 2007 movie Alpha Dog as the father of the lead character's girlfriend.

In 2008 Thicke appeared in a major supporting role as Jim Jarlewski in the television series adaptation of Douglas Coupland's jPod.^[2]

That year, he also had a cameo appearance in the How I Met Your Mother episode "Sandcastles in the Sand" as the dad in Robin's second "Robin Sparkles" music video.^[3] in addition to this, he also guest starred as himself in the episode "The Rough Patch" as a friend of Robin, from her pop star era. He also appeared on a website made specifically for the show, canadiansexacts.org, featured in the episode "Old King Clancy".

In February 2009, Thicke made a guest appearance on adult swim's Tim and Eric Awesome Show, Great Job. In the same month, he made a guest appearance on the web series Star-ving.^[4]

Thicke had a role in the 2009 film The Goods: Live Hard, Sell Hard. On July 10, 2009, Thicke appeared on the 1000th episode of Attack Of The Show, and sang a song with Kevin Pereira and Olivia Munn, at the end kissing Munn.

Books authored by Alan Thicke

• Thicke, Alan (June 2003). How Men Have Babies: The Pregnant Father's Survival Guide. Jodere Group. ISBN 978-1588720603. 

• Thicke, Alan (April 27, 2006). How To Raise Kids Who Won't Hate You. iUniverse Star. ISBN 978-1583488409. 

References

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Alan Thicke

• Alan Thicke official website
• Alan Thicke at TV.com
• Alan Thicke at the Internet Movie Database
• Alan Thicke at the Internet Broadway Database
• Alan Thicke at Yahoo! Movies
• Alan Thicke at MySpace