American guru in the multimillion dollar industry of diet and physical fitness. Simmons developed an extremely popular diet and exercise program for the overweight American. Extremely overweight himself as a kid, he went the usual route of popping diet pills and crash diets. He briefly lived in Italy before relocating to Los Angeles in 1973, where he opened his first studio. He made an attempt at acting, getting a stint on the soap “General Hospital” in 1979, before focusing entirely on building a fitness empire.
He launched his own talk show, “The Richard Simmons Show,” 1980, which lasted four seasons. He successfully marketed his image to the public, while writing self-help books, creating the “Deal-A-Meal” food maintenance program, and producing the Sweatin’ to the Oldies line of exercise videos.
Simmons has become a staple on late night television, bringing his irreverent humor and indefatigable energy to “The Tonight Show” and “Late Night with David Letterman.” With a rigorous touring schedule that includes 250 personal appearances each year, he continues to promote physical well-being to millions of loyal followers.
His books include “Reach for Fitness: A Special Book of Exercises for the Physically Challenged,” “Richard Simmons’ Never Say Diet Book” and “The Richard Simmons’ Farewell to Fat Cookbook” and the “Richard Simmons’ Never Give Up: Inspirations, Reflections, Stories of Hope.” His autobiography is titled, “Still Hungry After All These Years: My Story.”
The fitness guru allegedly slapped a man on March 24, 2004 at a Phoenix airport after the fellow made a remark about Simmons’ exercise videos. The man shouted, “Hey, everybody, it’s Richard Simmons. Let’s drop our bags and rock to the ‘50s.” Simmons was cited for a misdemeanor assault and claimed that the slap was merely playful, according to the police report. He allegedly told the victim “it’s not nice to make fun of people with issues.”
Link to Wikipedia biography