Grant Tinker, who brought “The Mary Tyler Moore Show” and other hits to the screen and who helped spearhead the return of a faltering NBC to prominence died at his Los Angeles home this week, it was announced today. He was 90.
Tinker died Monday, said Mark Tinker, one of his sons.
Tinker founded MTM Enterprises in 1970 with then-wife Mary Tyler Moore. In addition to the groundbreaking The Mary Tyler Moor Show,” MTM also had such hit series as “Rhoda,” “The Bob Newhart Show” and “Hill Street Blues.”
But in television circles, Tinker is even more well-known for his tenure as chairman of NBC starting 1981.
“When he took over the peacock network in 1981, it was routinely finishing a distant third to competitors ABC and CBS. Tinker, embracing his mantra of ‘first be best, then be first,’ led NBC back to prominence alongside the late head of NBC’s entertainment division Brandon Tartikoff, with a formidable run of blockbuster shows including Cheers,” The Cosby Show,” Family Ties” and The Golden Girls,” according to a report on the NBC website.
Tinker was a Television Hall of Fame inductee and winner of a Peabody Award in 2004.
Grant Tinker was a great man who made an indelible mark on NBC and the history of television that continues to this day,” said NBCUniversal CEO Steve Burke.
“He loved creative people and protected them, while still expertly managing the business. Very few people have been able to achieve such a balance. We try to live up to the standards he set each and every day. Our hearts go out to his family and friends.”
