'WKRP in Cincinnati' creator dead at age 74

Forrest Sellers
Cincinnati Enquirer
Hugh Wilson, the creator of "WKRP in Cincinnati" died during the holiday weekend. He was 74.

"As God is my witness, I thought turkeys could fly."

The writer of this classic line as well as the creator of the show which featured it died over the holiday weekend, according to The Hollywood Reporter. Hugh Wilson was 74.

Wilson penned the classic episode "Turkeys Away" for the program "WKRP in Cincinnati," which ran for four seasons on the CBS network. 

"Jerry Blum who was the general manager of WQXI told me that he had been fired from a Texas radio station for throwing turkeys out of a helicopter. I turned to Jerry and said, 'You just won me an Emmy,'" Wilson said in an interview conducted with various Emmy TV legends for the Archive of American Television.

In an interview with The Enquirer, Wilson said he based the series on an inept radio station in Atlanta, where he was an advertising executive. He had never been to Cincinnati, but chose the city because "it just sounded right with WKRP," he said.

 

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Wilson also co-wrote and directed the first "Police Academy" movie in 1984 and had a career that extended into the early 2000s, according to The Hollywood Reporter. His directing credits included "The First Wives Club," and "Guarding Tess."

'WKRP in Cincinnati'

An early boost to his writing career followed a stint as a gopher at MTM Productions where he wrote scripts for "The Bob Newhart Show" and "The Tony Randall Show." 

Nancy Daly contributed to this article.