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Daily Inspiration Quote by Regis Philbin

"Is that your final answer? Here in New York garbage men, bus drivers, taxi cab drivers, bus drivers, whoever, you know, people just yell it out to me. So that was a lot of fun"

About this Quote

Regis Philbin is describing fame the way only a daytime-TV lifer can: not as glamour, but as a catchphrase ricocheting off the city. "Is that your final answer?" is, on paper, a game-show prompt. In his mouth it becomes portable currency, a password New Yorkers toss across the street at the guy who once owned prime-time suspense with a raised eyebrow and a half-smile.

The repetition of "bus drivers" and the quick pile-up of working jobs ("garbage men, bus drivers, taxi cab drivers... whoever") matters. Philbin isn’t name-dropping VIPs; he’s locating his celebrity at street level, among the people who keep New York moving. That choice is strategic and deeply Regis: he built an empire on being the most approachable man on television, the host who felt like your uncle in a tie, not an untouchable star. The subtext is that real cultural power isn’t measured by awards or critics, but by whether strangers feel entitled to heckle you affectionately at a red light.

Even the casual "you know" does work. It signals a performer translating a surreal experience into normal conversation, turning a potentially invasive loss of privacy into a shared joke. The closer, "So that was a lot of fun", is a masterclass in showbiz reframing: fame as a public call-and-response, not a burden. In a pre-social-media era, this is what going viral sounded like - shouted from a bus window, not typed into a comment thread.

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Citation Formats

APA Style (7th ed.)
Philbin, Regis. (2026, January 15). Is that your final answer? Here in New York garbage men, bus drivers, taxi cab drivers, bus drivers, whoever, you know, people just yell it out to me. So that was a lot of fun. FixQuotes. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/is-that-your-final-answer-here-in-new-york-128788/

Chicago Style
Philbin, Regis. "Is that your final answer? Here in New York garbage men, bus drivers, taxi cab drivers, bus drivers, whoever, you know, people just yell it out to me. So that was a lot of fun." FixQuotes. January 15, 2026. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/is-that-your-final-answer-here-in-new-york-128788/.

MLA Style (9th ed.)
"Is that your final answer? Here in New York garbage men, bus drivers, taxi cab drivers, bus drivers, whoever, you know, people just yell it out to me. So that was a lot of fun." FixQuotes, 15 Jan. 2026, https://fixquotes.com/quotes/is-that-your-final-answer-here-in-new-york-128788/. Accessed 7 Feb. 2026.

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Is that your final answer? - Regis Philbin
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About the Author

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Regis Philbin (August 25, 1933 - July 24, 2020) was a Entertainer from USA.

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