Anthony F. Verna (November 26, 1933 – January 18, 2015) was a producer of television sports and entertainment blockbusters.
Verna was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He died in Palm Desert, California at the age of 81.
Verna's broadcast hallmark was an ability to continually come up with advances in the use of cameras, program content and creative interplay. It was this skill that prompted him to use a trick left over from radio days in order to outwit the technology of the times and allow for a play on the field to be re-broadcast "instantly."
Verna's varied career includes creating, producing and directing Pope John Paul II's billion-viewer television special "A Prayer for World Peace" and the historic music spectacular "Live Aid." As President of Caesar's Palace Productions, Verna was involved in all their spectacular entertainment projects.
Notables who collaborated with Verna
Verna worked with and or and was friends with such notables as Presidents Ronald Reagan and George H. W. Bush, Grace Kelly, Mother Teresa, Edward R. Murrow, Larry King, Rod Stewart, Burt Reynolds, Dizzy Dean, Milton Berle, Duke Ellington, Ray Charles, Mick Jagger, Christopher Reeve, Tom Selleck, Mickey Mantle, Joe DiMaggio, Rocky Marciano, Kirk Douglas, Chevy Chase, Johnny Cash and John Denver.
Tony Verna produced and/or directed the following major television events:
1955 – Major League Baseball Game of the Week with Dizzy Dean
1962 – Josip Broz Tito----ski jumping---Yugoslavia
1963 – (Dec-7) Invented the instant replay first used for the 1963 Army–Navy Game
1964 – Directed Kentucky Derby (first of 12)
1967 – Las Vegas – Liberace Special
1967 – Johnny Unitas – Instant Quarterback
1968 – Rocky Marciano, Jonathan Winters Jogging
1968 – Directed Super Bowl#2 (first of 5)
1968 – Harlem Globetrotters–Soupy Sales
1968 – Roy Rogers, Dale Evans Special
1970 – Created The Battle of the NFL Cheerleaders CBS