1980s Workout Videos|Richard Simmons Workout Videos|Richard Simmons Exercise videos - YouTube 1980s Workout Videos|Richard Simmons Workout Videos|Richard Simmons Exercise videos Want to watch this again later? Sign in to add this video to a playlist. Need to report the video? Sign in to report inappropriate content. Rating is available when the video has been rented. This feature is not available right now. Please try again later. Published on Jun 8, 2013 1980s Workout Videos Richard Simmons exercise videos ... Disco Sweat is one of the best. The dance moves are easy to follow, and Richard Simmons instructions is really easy to follow. Sweating to the oldies was one of Richard Simmons best compilations series. The songs are still fun to listen to , and time goes by quickly. In my opinion this is still one of the best 1980's workout videos.

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Celebrity Fitness Stars: Richard Simmons - AARP The Magazine AARP The Magazine by Austin O'Connor, AARP The Magazine , December 10, 2010| RICHARD SIMMONS These days, the flamboyant Simmons may be known best for his bizarrely funny talk show appearances with the likes of David Letterman, Jay Leno and Howard Stern, but back in the ’80s and ’90s, he was a true fitness icon. <b>Related Video:</b><br><br> <object width="200" height="180"><param name="movie" value=""></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="200" height="180"></embed></object> "Change is never easy but it is possible!": Watch a segment from an early-'80s episode of The Richard Simmons Show. Related Who's your favorite fitness guru?

Discuss The Louisiana native often credits his obesity during his teen years — and his subsequent weight loss in his early twenties — as his motivation to help others struggling with weight and self-esteem issues. His self-titled syndicated exercise show debuted in 1980. During the show’s four-season run, it won two Daytime Emmy Awards as Outstanding Talk/Service Series. In the ’90s, Simmons made a comeback via his Sweatin’ to the Oldies line of fitness videos (remember the ubiquitous infomercials?), in which he led exercisers through fitness routines set to rock hits from the ’50s and ’60s. In 2010, Simmons released a boxed set called Sweatin’ for Life (which includes a new Sweatin’ to the Oldies video), and he continues to teach fitness classes at his Slimmons Studio in Beverly Hills. Videofitness Workout Reviews: Sweatin' to the Oldies Series Sweatin' to the Oldies Series Show oldest reviews first Sweatin to the Oldies 2 I love the first sweatin to the Oldies, but could not warm to this one.

It seems really sloppy compared to the first one, and while the music is still really great, I just couldn't get into it. Richard's cuing is terrible. He gives no warning to the props you might need and then, all of a sudden, the whole class has chairs in front of them and you are scrambling to get one there before they are done with the prop. There is also a long abdominals section which I found to be just plain boring...just basic crunches and oblique work. I did not like this video at all. It seems far too long and I felt some strain on my body that I didn't feel I should be feeling. 02/28/2004 The music is all remakes of songs from the 50's and 60's...the stuff I grew up dancing to with my dad and mom. Songs include: Dancin' In The Streets, Beyond the Sea, He's a Rebel, Ain't no mountain High Enough, It's my Party, wipeout...there's a couple of others, I'm sure, but I can't recall them right now. The footwork is simple...nothing to tangle you up...and the music is fun and inspiring.

The class is huge and the set is high school reunion - inspired. The members of the class are all different shapes and sizes and they sometimes fumble, which only serves to endear them. They are people who are on their weight los journeys and at the end of the workout, they are all introduced in a little dance-off and it is printed on the screen how much weight each has lost. Some of them still have a ways to go...and to find out that they have already lost over 100lbs makes the tape even more inspiring. Richard doesn't cue very much, but the moves are simple and after a couple of times through, you don't even miss the cues that aren't there. This is probably the nicest feature of the whole tape...it lasts longer than just a couple of viewings. There aren't any comments in there that will only serve to annoy you the 20th time you do the video. The only downside to this tape is that it isn't available on DVD...but if it ever is, I guarantee I'll be buying it. This tape makes my hall of fame, even though I don't do it very often, it is a nice tape to come home to.

Instructor Comments: Time and Time again, I always seem to find myself coming back to this one. It is fun, richard isn't overly annoying in it, like he tends to be in some of his later videos, and it's a good 40 min cardio workout. 01/03/2004 Sweatin' One and Two are both excellent low-impact beginner tapes. The original requires no equipment so you can do it anywhere. Sweatin' Two requires a straight back chair, small hand weights, and a mat. It's also longer. They do require a few practice runs to learn the moves, but for me, a pretty rotten dancer, the routines have brought out some gracefulness. I bought Sweatin' One in 1997 and used it off and on over the years, but never stuck to any exercise program for years. Last fall I started Dr. Miriam Nelson's "Strong Women" weight training program, and after 3 months of strengthening, added aerobics back in, sticking with Richard. Now I do his workouts at least 5 times per week in addition to weights.

They always make me sweat, but even at first, there was not a lot of panting or gulping for air. I have advanced to the intermediate level and purchased tapes by more challenging instructors, but they don't fit as well for me; I would rather do a Richard workout in the morning and another at night, than doing a more challenging video just once a day; could be inefficient use of time for some, but it means I am doing 1.5 hours a day of gentle cardio and keeping that heart rate moderately elevated all that time, and enjoying every minute! Richard is flamboyant but very motivating, positive, fun, non-threatening and does not really take himself or even fitness too seriously. These are great videos to do with a few girlfriends, you laugh with Richard and at yourselves doing the steps. I love him! Instructor Comments: 07/13/2003 Here's a bit of background to set this review in context: I am a long-time strength exerciser who absolutely detests cardio. Having started with Firm videos over 10 years ago, I am also cursed with being somewhat of a video snob, but these days am trying to be a bit more open minded.

If the workout is appealing enough I can easily discount lousy production values and a certain amount of "not-my-taste," or "cheese" factor. A persistent and very strong back injury has put me on the sidelines for a bit, so I cruised the local ilbrary looking for something easy that would at least get me to move and ease out the pain. There I found the first 2 volumes of Simmons "Sweatin' to the Oldies." Snob that I am I snuck them out of the library and made sure no one in my house found them. I then did them back to back, starting with Volume 2. My responses to these are very strong in very opposite directions. After a decade of the Firm and Anna Benson's quite controlling influence and style, I felt like an anthropologist stepping into uncharted terrain while doing these tapes. The focal point, of course, is Richard Simmons. His main purpose is to get people, ALL of them, up and moving, which he does very successfully. In spite of the fact that the cuing ranges from non-existent to lousy, all of the people with him know what to do. AND they are all having fun.

Yes, the workouts and production values are totally cheesy and the music is a live band doing covers of old songs, but the fact that you know all of the songs and can sing along with them add to a certain comfort level of familiarity and you can at least move, even if not you're not quite sure how. To me, that is the charm. Personally I can't see doing them again but I was thrilled to see so many different kinds of bodies just having fun in public. He starts both tapes with a loosening up song, then a stretch song, then a bunch of other songs, then a cool down. Volume 2 has some light upper body and ab work. I was pleasantly surprised that the movements, all low-impact, were rather varied from song to song. However, the songs in Volume 2 go on much too long and the moves get a bit tedious. It does provide more time to learn them, since the gimmicky camera angles and his lack of "teaching" don't offer any help. I did keep wondering how he can get his feet to go always go in the opposite direction of his knees.

Anyway, while I am constantly intrigued by him, I will never want to watch too much of him, but his outcome is terrific. And, my back felt better. 07/19/2001 I find Richard's Sweatin' to the Oldies 1 & 2 quite motivating still (although they've gotten easier for me.) Initially I found that they were tiring (they are an hour in length) and I would look at the cast and think "he/she is as big (or bigger) as me, if they can do it, I can too." I still use Richard occasionally, when I just don't feel like working out because the music is motivating. (Although I don't like the band in III, they aren't as good.) Richard takes a lot time (10 minutes) to warm you up so his videos are a good choice for people who are very out of shape. People who are morbidly obese (over 300-400 lbs) may find they have to modify extensively (doing it sitting on a chair at first) or use the workout in "Starting Out" which is easier). I prefer the choreography in I & II as it's easier to increase the intensity.

Although Sweat and Shout (aka 4), has great music (and a gospel choir), I didn't like the choreography. Number 2 includes some very light toning. At the end of the videos, the cast come out and you learn how much weight many of them have lost which is also inspiring for those of us who have lots to lose. Most people have strong feelings about Richard, you either love him or hate him. I find his energy motivating and I think he's funny. (I still laugh over his facial expressions and actions in "It's My Party" in I and I've seen it many times.) The fact that he's been very overweight himself (and uses some overweight people in his cast), makes his videos very approachable to those who are quite overweight. (However, he shouldn't try to sing along as he occaisionally does). 10/24/1999 These videos are all about the same. An easy warm up, aerobics, (volume 2 also has toning) and a cool down with a pseudo-stretch (they aren't real stretches and they aren't held long enough).

The exercisers are all shapes and sizes and ages, in a good sized group (volume 1 has the fewest people) and they rotate around the room so everyone has a turn in the spotlight. There is a live band playing oldies tunes, sometimes they interact with the exercisers, sometimes an exerciser sings, and in #2, an Elvis impersonator stops by! There are lighting and camera effects which don't always help you follow the work out. This is important because Simmons will motivate and inspire but he's not so good at cueing and instructing. Each song has a routine with high repetition so they are fairly easy to learn after a few one or two times through. The steps are very basic and sometimes only your arm movements will change. Also, there are some shimmying and twist motions and they aren't so great on carpet. But they are fun, and Richard and his crew are obviously having themselves a good ole time. If you want the production numbers and the unabashed enthusiasm he is well known for, these videos are great for beginners. Intermediates will enjoy them if they like oldies and want a less intense video for recovery or off days.

Instructor Comments: If there is anyone instructor that gives me the impression he wants you to succeed, its Richard Simmons. You might not like his videos, but its hard not like him. He is so geuinely motivating and concerned, I get the impression he'd come over to every person who writes him a letter's house and share tea and tears with them. No one does a better job of motivating out of shape to get up and move. He's less angry than Susan Powter, more fun than Leslie Sansone and funnier than Denise Austin. If you need or want motivation, encouragement and inspiration, and you want it in spades, Richard's videos will have you sweatin' to the oldies and having a great time. 06/30/1999 This was the first workout video I'd ever done. I needed a change in my life, and i was looking for a beginning guideline. I really enjoy working out to the oldies. I started 4 years ago, and with the tape, I felt I reached a plateau. To remedy this I used hand and ankle weights to make the movements more effective. All in all it's a great program.

08/15/1997 This was the video that got me off the couch. I stayed with it for 2.5 years. The music in this video is great. The classic tunes are played by a band. Setting is a gymnasium. The moves are basic and easy to follow. The impact level is low however I added higher impact moves as I advanced. Richard doesn't give many cues however you repeat the moves a lot and they are very easy to follow. There are 10 songs and the first three songs are warm up songs. The next five sections are the main aerobic portion. The final two songs are the cool down. There are 16 other exercisers who range in all shapes, ages and sizes. GREAT beginner workout. (no date) Simmons is one of the funniest people I can think of. I mean that generally, not just in exercise video land. Did any one else see him on David Letterman tossing hams into the audience?! He's a scream. And he's great at what he does, getting people off their butts. Sometimes, actually, he's too great. Simmons goes over the top at times.

Its fine if you need or want the extra encouragement he gives, but some times it seems his mouth is flappin' more than his legs. Up until his fourth video, now called Sweat and Shout, he provided heart rate checks without explaining why, how to and what the goal was. In four, he drops the check altogether and uses a perceived exertion rating, which is not as accurate but much easier for the novice to do and use. The videos are absolute parties, from the band to the sets and lighting the large casts, and the fun music that definitely does not come out of an elevator. These tapes are great for beginners. They are easy, encouraging and fun. My only questions is from volume 2: what is up with the bottles? Why not just give the exercisers light hand weights and do real strength moves throughout instead of this weird little hand jivey type move? I did this tape with 5 lb. weights and found no value in this move except that it was cutesy. I don't do these tapes much anymore, I've moved on to tougher tapes. Occasionally, I will put a Sweatin' tape in and use it as an extended warm up for serious weight work.

I have not found other beginner level tapes with this much fun, good music and encouragement. Richard Simmons: DVDs & Movies | eBay DVDs & Movies | 12 sold It s a breakthrough exercise DVD that combines classic Rock 'n' Roll music from the 50's and 60's with energetic dance moves. Richard Simmons has been reaching out to the masses for over 30 years with... | 13 sold The fun never stops with Sweatin To The Oldies 2 featuring workout songs like The Loco-Motion, Fever, My Boyfriend's Back and many more! It'll have you breakin' into a sweat! Type of Workout: Aerobics... | 18 sold Do you want to look and feel firmer, fitter, stronger?. Most people do, but don’t know how to get started. Used with a set of dumbbells or my fabulous tonin’ rings, Totally Tonin’ will help you build ... | 3 sold Buy It Now Free Shipping Instructor's name: Richard Simmons. Type of Workout: Aerobics. Join me and my amazing cast of people - just like you - to "Turn Back Time" dancing to energized versions of your favorite '80's hits.

Yo... Buy It Now Free Shipping This DVD is still sealed and has never been opened. planning to leave this sealed for display purposes. Buy It Now Free Shipping Tonin to the Oldies DVD. Sweatin to the Oldies 5 DVD. Food Mover SET - plastic holder plus cards & booklets. Boogie Bands (2). Straight From the Heart DVD. | 5 sold Richard Simmons Sweatin' to the Oldies 3 - Join Richard & friends in this 1 hour low impact class that will have you dancing the calories away to hits like "Born to be Wild", "Build Me Up, Buttercup",... Buy It Now Free Shipping Richard Simmons Food Mover Kit. This sale is for 1 Food Mover Kit Only. Food Mover and cards. Food Mover Instructions and Blast Off Food Plan. I am very happy wih this food mover, It is very easy to u... Buy It Now Free Shipping About Richard About Richard A Biography of Richard Simmons Thirty years and 3,000,000 pounds later, Richard Simmons is still going strong.

Using his unique wit, passion and enthusiasm, Simmons, the nation’s most revered fitness expert, continues his crusade to reach out to the masses, encouraging them to take control of their fitness destiny. Delivering a serious message with his trademark humor, Simmons has helped millions of overweight men and women lose more than 3,000,000 pounds by adopting sensible balanced eating programs and exercise regimes that are energetic, fun and motivating. Growing up in the French quarter of New Orleans, where lard was a food group and dessert mandatory, Richard weighed 268 pounds when he graduated high school. An entrepreneur at a tender age, Simmons sold pralines on New Orleans street corners where he learned to charm and entertain his customers. After trying everything from bizarre diets to laxatives, Simmons took control of his weight by adopting a lifestyle of balance, moderate eating and exercise. Simmons prevailed in his own weight battle before relocating to Los Angeles in 1973. There was no significant fitness movement in this country at the time, and to no avail, Simmons attempted to find a health club that wasn’t for people who were already in shape.

After traversing LA, and unable to find a facility welcoming people of all shapes and sizes, his only alternative was to create that safe haven. In 1974, after consulting with doctors and nutritionists to ensure the safety of a program tailored to the needs of everyone, from the overweight and obese, to seniors and the physically challenged, a determined Simmons established an innovative place where the overweight of the world were welcomed with open arms. This program was met with instant success and continues today at SLIMMONS in Beverly Hills, where Richard still teaches. While many of his legions of fans are overweight, he resonates with everyone, including anyone who has just a few pounds to lose and wants to be fit. Simmons’ success as a fitness expert and advocate led to numerous local and national television and radio appearances including a four-year run on “General Hospital”, followed by his own nationally syndicated series, “The Richard Simmons Show”. The show ran for four years and received several Emmy Awards. Knowing that exercise and weight loss regimes must go hand-in hand, Simmons has created a series of products that integrate the two components. Deal-A-Meal and the FoodMover help people keep track of calories and portions.

His 65 fitness videos, which have sold over 20 million copies, pair lively music, with rockin’ routines and Simmons’ humorous banter and encouragement. With titles that include “Sweatin’ to the Oldies”, “Dance Your Pants Off”, “Party Off the Pounds”, “Disco Sweat”, “Blast Off the Pounds”, “Platinum Sweat”, and “Sit Tight” (a workout designed for people who cannot stand), Richard offers a routine for everyone. As the author of nine books, including the New York Times Best Seller, “Never Say Diet”, Richard released his autobiography, “Still Hungry-After All These Years” in 1998. He is also the author of three best-selling cookbooks. Throughout the years Richard still gets his greatest satisfaction from reaching out and literally touching his students. Recognizing that his audience spans all across America, Simmons averages some 250 days on tour each year. Whether it’s a women’s expo, a nursing home, a high school, children’s hospital, shopping mall or corporate seminar, Simmons considers himself fortunate to come face to face with hundreds of thousands of people each year.

Concerned about the financial impact of obesity in the workplace, several executive organizations have recently invited Simmons to speak to their members about ways to encourage their workers to lose weight. Alarmed by the growing epidemic of childhood obesity, Richard helped launch the Fit Kids Bill in Congress with the help of Congressmen Zach Wamp and Ron Kind. The effort is to ensure that physical education classes are reinstated or remain a part of the curriculum in public schools. Richard testified before a congressional committee and spoke of his own personal battle as an overweight child. Still fighting the fitness battle with humor and enthusiasm, Simmons vows to never give up and promises that he will continue his crusade until it’s time for him to teach classes at the Pearly Gates. Sweatin’ With the Oldie « by Bryan Curtis on May 23, 2013 He’s here,” the manager of the fitness studio said. A glow had been spotted. An aura had been detected. I turned and saw Richard Simmons standing in the doorway. His eyes were closed and his right arm caressed the doorjamb in the style of a ’40s movie starlet.

The rhinestones on Simmons’s tank top formed the shape of a giraffe — an odd animal for aerobics, but never mind. His pants were orange and yellow, and he wore white New Balance sneakers. Simmons walked toward me. At 64, he looks … older than you remember. His skinniness has an unearthly, Mick Jagger quality, and his once-proud Afro is a cinder cone encircling a bald spot. Two years ago, Simmons suffered the ultimate indignity: He had to go on Entertainment Tonight and explain that he wasn’t dying . “What are you doing here?” Simmons breathed. I was here to see how a Sweatin’ to the Oldies man was getting along in a P90X world. I was here to see how Simmons had crawled from the primordial ooze of ’80s talk shows — the world of Jack Hanna, Dr. Ruth Westheimer, and Dr. Joyce Brothers — and become something more enduring than mere kitsch. Simmons was going to work me out. Then he was going to talk to me. “I am?” he breathed. He walked away. Richard Simmons’s exercise studio is called Slimmons.

It’s on Civic Center Drive, in a sector of Beverly Hills that Simmons’s friend Regis Philbin calls the “other side of the tracks.” In the anteroom of Slimmons, framed VHS boxes show the rise of a fitness empire: the triple-platinum Oldies, Richard Simmons and the Silver Foxes, The Stomach Formula. The anteroom opens into a long, rectangular exercise room that has scuffed pink pastel walls and a disco ball hanging from the ceiling. Slimmons is a happy place. “Grumpy people go to Equinox,” the manager, Sherry, had told me before Simmons arrived. She was scurrying around trying to get everything just so. When Simmons teaches hour-long aerobics classes on Tuesday nights, Thursday nights, and Saturday mornings (his employees fill in the other slots), he demands house music be playing when he steps out of the car. The 50 or so exercisers who had gathered Tuesday had to be standing, Sherry said, so Simmons could greet them individually. Men would likely be asked to remove their shirts. It costs $12 to attend. “Absolutely no farting,” Simmons said as marched to the front of the room.

“People eat fucking Mexican food and I have to suffer.” He put on “It’s Raining Men” and we got moving. Out of sheer cardiovascular terror, I hid in the back. I couldn’t see Simmons well, and had to wait for his moves to ripple through the class and make their way to me. This meant I was doing the Monkey (balled fists shaken up and down) while everyone else was doing the Hitchhike (hand with thumbs out to the right, then left). Every so often, Simmons would materialize from among the sweaty bodies, like an enemy soldier in tall grass, and bark commands. “No baby steps. Get your shit together!” “Sir, you must be bad in bed!” “I want your underwear to be wet!” The last one came after he’d shut off Slimmons’s only fan. A woman in the back muttered something, and when Simmons couldn’t get the woman to share the comment, he threatened to close the studio doors and make us sweat more. “Turn on me and I’ll close the doors like Anne Frank,” he said to an audible gasp. We formed a circle. Simmons beckoned a twentysomething man with a shaved head to the center of the floor.

Simmons told the man to stand with his legs spread apart, and then laid flat on the floor and began to worm his way between them. When Simmons had done that, he told the man to drop and do push-ups, so that his face bobbed close to Simmons’s. I didn’t catch the man’s name or get his story, but I heard Simmons tell him, “You’ve been through a lot. There’s a reason God let you live.” My knee lifts got higher to hide my face. I didn’t want to go to the middle. Mostly, I didn’t want to doff my shirt and kill everyone at Slimmons. Sherry the manager told me that when she first came to Slimmons as a customer, carrying extra weight after an injury, she thought, Maybe I need to go where the fat people are. This is the truth of the place: You get there and realize the fat person is you. Simmons slowly motioned me into the center of the floor. The two of us met there, face-to-face, about 5 feet apart. Simmons made his fists and threw a right uppercut, then a left. I made two fists and mirrored him.

We danced like two of Edgar Rice Burroughs’s killer apes, while the rest of the exercisers clapped around us. I felt the aura, the glow. I wanted to please this odd, aging man so he would fuss over me like he had over so many of his subjects. I curled my upper lip as I punched. Simmons opened his mouth in mock terror. Later, when I was gasping in the anteroom, Sherry said, “My gosh, Bryan, you’re covered in sweat!” I‘m a real paradox,” Richard Simmons said. “Because I’m a very serious person and I take my work very seriously. But I wrap it up in a court jester and a clown and make people laugh and make them feel good about themselves.” Simmons was born in New Orleans in 1948. He was named Milton, but decided he preferred Richard, the name of a beloved uncle. As a boy, Simmons used his allowance to sneak turkey dinners at Woolworth’s on Canal Street. By college, he developed a “funny fat guy” persona that got him cast in Federico Fellini’s Satyricon and as a singing meatball in a commercial.

He got serious about weight when someone left a note on his car that said, “Richard — You’re very funny, but fat people die young. Please don’t die.” Jack LaLanne came from a time when there was little fitness culture. Simmons came from a time when fitness culture — at least in L.A. — was everywhere. Bikram Choudhury was teaching yoga; Ron Fletcher was teaching Pilates; Vince Gironda was squiring muscleheads around his gym in North Hollywood. Simmons tried and rejected them all. “I didn’t see any overweight people,” he said. “Where were they going? As a matter of fact, they weren’t going anywhere.” Simmons’s genius was to find a client who was being left out. It was the person who weighed 300-plus pounds. It was the homebound man or woman gazing longingly at late-night infomercials. His Sweatin’ to the Oldies video, which came out in 1988, was set in a high school gym. “This is the chance to dance at the high school prom you always dreamed of,” Simmons announced. He was selling boomers the prom they’d never had and the reunion that was around the corner.

Simmons founded his studio on Civic Center Drive in 1975. Initially, the building had two parts. The workout space was called the Anatomy Asylum. The salad bar was called Ruffage. Simmons made the walls and floors all white so that only vegetables had color. The late ’70s was a swell time to be a fitness guru. Tony Little and the Shake Weight hadn’t come along. There was room for improvisation. “We didn’t know what we were doing as much,” says Kathy Smith, who sold more than 16 million DVDs. “There weren’t as many rules. As science has caught up with all this, science says you have do 20 seconds on, 10 seconds off. Back then, you had Richard singing Judy Garland songs and doing leg-ups.” I told Simmons I had a theory about his outrageousness. The overweight person who walked into the gym for the first time was terrified of being ridiculed, of sticking out. But Simmons’s performance had a way of breaking the ice, because the person soon realized no one was looking at them.

“I put a spell on people,” he breathed, “so they don’t know they’re working out … An enchanting spell, where they just don’t think about it, or overthink it, and then at the end they go, ‘Wow, I feel good.'” It was only a matter of time before television added Simmons to its permanent guest list. “I’m responsible,” said Regis Philbin, who began booking Simmons on his A.M. Los Angeles show in the late 1970s. “I take full credit for that and anything else that goes with it.” “You know who discovered him was my wife, Joy,” Philbin said. “It was around 1975. She’d heard from a girlfriend that there was this guy who was totally different in the way he operated his exercise classes. So she went! She was taken by him. She said, ‘He would be great on your TV show.’ Frankly, that’s how it started.” LaLanne was already a talk-show regular, leading the audience in exercises while a host gamely kept up. “Jack was terrific for years and years,” Philbin said. “But Jack appealed more to the men.

Here was a guy who was really for the women.” Simmons’s female army was key to his endurance. “It was a daytime show,” says Maury Povich, who began booking Simmons in the early ’90s. “Who were we trying to attract? Women. That’s right up Richard’s alley.” There are male Simmons fans, too. I met Steven Kessel, who’d traveled from Cocoa Beach, Florida, to work out at Slimmons. Kessel had gone from 208 pounds to 163. “And I’ve kept it off for two years,” he said. He’d announced his progress in class to loud applause. “Ten or 15 years ago,” Kessel said of Simmons, “I saw him on David Letterman. Dave was mocking him. I know Richard has to go through all kinds of stuff to get through the Letterman gauntlet. But he reaches people, like me, who need to be reached.” This was Simmons’s greatest feat: He’d let himself be mocked, turned into a gag, but had somehow maintained his hold on his audience.

As the ’80s ticked into the ’90s, Simmons would go on with Maury or Sally Jessy and talk about morbid cases. There would be a 1,000-pound man — I seem to remember this — who had to be carted out of his house on the stretcher zookeepers used for polar bears. But for Simmons’s tears, the poor guy could have been the fat man in a circus sideshow. “He was able to take what some people would think of as grotesque and make it a life-and-death situation,” says Povich. “It was very dramatic.” Indeed, mortality hangs over Simmons. He has lost many of his most cherished clients. This has given him a dour outlook, as if plus-size ghosts are following him around. “I could be hit by a Sara Lee truck tomorrow,” Simmons told me. “Which is not a bad way of going: ‘Richard Simmons Found in a Freeway in Pound Cake and Fudge, With a Smile on His Face.’ Let’s face it. We don’t know anything.” The knock on Simmons was that beneath the cheerleading, he had no idea what he was talking about.

On the first Sweatin’ to the Oldies video, Simmons never managed to name the exercises or explain what muscles they were working. Twice he told viewers to check their heart rates, but didn’t explain what a healthy heart rate might be. It was like he was checking to make sure we were still alive. Winifred Morice, a nutritionist who worked for Simmons for 16 years, said, “The first cookbook I gave to Richard to look at just before it went to press, and he made one change. I’d written, ‘Recipes developed by Winifred Morice.’ He put, ‘Recipes developed by Richard Simmons and Winifred Morice.'” As Morice admits, Simmons made up for it with unrestrained benevolence. If a person asked him for help, he’d call that person for months or even years. “I talk to people every day: 200, 300, 500 pounds,” Simmons said. “But I tell them the truth and I’m very honest with them. Some of them get it and some people are very much in denial. I never stop calling them.

Because one day, one day, it’s going to turn around for them.” I met Cindy Sciacca, who had been working out with Simmons for three years. “He remembers everyone,” Sciacca said. “He knows if it’s your first class or your 100th class … If you haven’t shown up in a while or if you’re huffing and puffing, he’ll go, ‘What did you eat today?!'” Simmons had absorbed Sciacca into his professional family. She had been cast in Project H.O.P.E., his new videos that come with an electronic device called the FoodMover. When Sciacca scored an acting gig, in an underground cabaret beneath a Mexican restaurant in Silver Lake, Simmons showed up and bought half the tickets in the room. “He came backstage before the show,” Sciacca said, “and I was practically naked. He wanted to try on all my wigs.” This is why it’s useless to accuse Simmons of hucksterism. All gurus, from Simmons to Dr. Atkins, are hucksters. They’re tricking us into doing something we don’t want to do by promising it will be easier than we ever suspected.

Short of selling pills, they are as much counselors as they are nutritionists. I mentioned P90X and other nouveau workouts to Simmons. “The problem is it’s rush-rush, fast-fast, harder-stronger,” he said, “and that spells injury, injury, injury. Once you injure yourself, if you hurt your calf or your Achilles tendon, it’s hard to come back. I’ve always practiced this: Love yourself. Move your body. Watch your portions.” It is vague but unassailable. The last few months have been strange even by Simmons’s standards. In February, he told talk-show host Wendy Williams he wanted to “lick your inner thighs” and “lick your eyes,” forcing Williams to cut short a segment that was supposed to be about the Oscars. On Access Hollywood Live, Simmons talked in a mock-Indian accent before being admonished by (of all people) Billy Bush. His crusades have grown increasingly frantic. This spring, Simmons took up the unlikely cause of saving Auburn University’s aviation program . In a video, he skewered the dean who threatened to cut the program as a “deany-weenie.” But the most striking thing is how little Simmons’s corner of the fitness universe has changed.

Those who were left behind by yoga and Pilates in the ’70s are now left behind by P90X, CrossFit, and even The Biggest Loser, which is as close as pop culture has come to replicating Simmons’s formula. Simmons also has a bigger client base. In 1988, when Sweatin’ to the Oldies was released, the adult obesity rate in America was around 23 percent. Now, it’s 35 percent. It is not just the same kind of people who seek out Simmons, but the same people. “The one thing that I did feel is that people felt more connected with Richard when they were heavy than when they were at their goal weight,” said Winifred Morice. “They felt he didn’t give them the same attention, because his attention, of course, was on people who needed him the most. They felt ostracized. Subconsciously, I think some of them gained their weight back to be needed by Richard again.” “I get up at 3:30 in the morning,” Simmons told me. Reading e-mail from your fans? I asked.

“I wake up and there’s like 600.” And you write long e-mails back to all these people? “I don’t send long e-mails back. It can be as simple as, ‘Know your self-worth.’ ‘Try harder this week.’ ‘Know that I love you — and I believe in you.'” Like an overworked minister, Simmons has become a master of the instant benediction. After 40 years, I asked, do you feel the accumulation of all these needy people? “My life is not easy,” Simmons said. “This is my passion and my crusade — this is what God wants me to do. But I can’t say it’s an easy walk in the park. Because it’s not. I take everything personal. If people gain a pound back, I take it personal. If people don’t lose weight, maybe I should have called them or talked to them. It’s never-ending. But when the clock strikes 11 and I go to bed, I feel good about what I did and hope that I can do it again tomorrow.” I told Simmons he was more religious than I’d thought. “I was raised very Catholic,” he said. “It’s hard to go to church because everyone stares at me.

But my parents said you could just kneel down in your own bedroom and your own church.” What is it like being a 64-year-old fitness instructor? I asked. “It’s harder,” he said. “There are more overweight children. More overweight teens who want to kill themselves. Overweight young adults who don’t know what they’re doing. Overweight seniors who have lost loved ones and don’t want to live and don’t want to eat. Oh, it’s much more challenging now.” Then he turned to me. It was like a red light had come on over my head, like a director had called “Action!” on a scene of emotional catharsis. “At the end of the day,” he said, his eyes welling with tears, “when the tank top is off and I’ve cleaned my face, did I save a life?” I mumbled something and looked down at my recorder. When I looked up, Simmons was staring at me with teary eyes. I looked down again, mumbled something else, and found his eyes still locked on mine. And again, Simmons said nothing. He just stared. It was a performance, without a doubt.

But what could a snarky person — Regis or Dave or a writer — say? You could say that Simmons is ridiculous, or that he is an enthusiastic amateur, but you couldn’t question his belief. It was this ability to claim the moral high ground that allowed Simmons to persevere where his pop culture fellow-travelers had not. In a strange way, Richard Simmons was the only sincere product of the ’80s. Simmons stared at me for 15 full seconds. Finally, he stood up. “You’re a good man,” Simmons said, before kissing me on both cheeks and sending me into the night.

Question: Who has a series of weight-loss tapes called "Sweatin' to the Oldies"?
Answer: Richard Simmons