As a child, Broderick Stephen Harvey or Steve Harvey was the youngest of five children. According to Grant Cardone, a journalist from the Medium stated, “Steve Harvey didn’t grow up in a household of money or any sort of wealth”. He also stated that “Harvey’s only goal was to be on Television as an entertainer to share his love and passion for entertainment”. Steve Harvey would attend Glenville High School and graduate in 1974. After high school he would attend Kent State University where after three years he would flunk out, and later saying in an interview “It really threw my life into a downward spiral, and I regret not getting that degree”.
Early career+standup
After he flunked out of Kent State University he started to do many jobs such as being an autoworker, a boxer, a carpet cleaner, a Insurance salesman, and a mailman. During this time, Steve Harvey would marry his first wife Marcia in 1981 and started a family. Steve would have two daughters with Marcia. During interview with Steve Harvey by Leah Rozen stated, “After winning the 50$ first place prize at a comedy club’s amateur night” after winning Steve quit his job as an insurance salesman to become a stand-up comedian. His wife was not happy with this as Steve Harvey was unable to provide for his family, because of this his wife would separate from him, finalizing the divorce in 1994. His relationships with the two daughters would fall apart after this.
During this time for the first year Steve only made around $3,000. At this time 75% of his paychecks would go to Marcia and the two daughters giving him as little as $50 a week. For 3 years In a paradise interview with Steve Harvey he would say that at this time he would become homeless having to sleep in his car when his comedy gigs didn’t give him a hotel and showering at gas stations and public swimming pools. He would be on the road taking any comedy gig he could get. By the early 1990s Steve would be more known in big city comedy clubs.
Shows
After gaining more and more fame from doing comedy shows he would start being invited to do tv shows. One of the shows he would make an appearance on is the Johnnie Walker National Comedy Search as well as the HBO show Def Comedy Jam. He became the host for the show It’s Showtime at the Apollo from 1993 to 2000. During that time, Steve Harvey would create the tv show, Me and the Boys and would be a star in it but it would only last one season due to the low viewership the show had. His first major TV hit was The Steve Harvey show. Starting in 1996 and ending in 2002. The show was a sitcom set in the city that featured Steve Harvey as a music teacher. Steve would be part of many other shows but his most popular show he is still a part of is Family Feud where in 2010 he became the host of the gameshow after John O’Hurley would stop being the host. Many of the other shows he was in was The Proud Family (2001), My Wife and Kids (2002), The Parkers (2003), Steve Harvey’s Big Time Challenge (2003–2005), Who Wants to Be a Millionaire (2010), Praise the Lord (2012), Steve Harvey (2012–2017), Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee (2015), Miss Universe (2015–2019, 2021) , Little Big Shots (2016–2018), Steve Harvey’s Funderdome (2017), Steve (2017–2019), NFL Honors (2019–2021),Steve on Watch(2020–present), and Judge Steve Harvey (2022–present). Being in all of these shows has made Steve very prominent in the growth of comedy as well as being seen by millions of people who have viewed his shows.
