Sager Family Traveling Foundation & Roadshow
Bobby Sager the Inspiration for NBC's "The Philanthropist"
Aug 26, 2009
The amazing story of Teddy Rist, the billionaire entrepreneur playboy-turned-rebel philanthropist seems farfetched at best. In the pilot episode, viewers of NBC’s Wednesday night drama “The Philanthropist” find Rist (played by James Purefoy) rescuing a little boy in a hurricane and riding through the Nigerian jungle on a motorcycle under gunfire to deliver a box of vaccines. While this might seem like made-for-TV drama, the storyline is based on the adventures of real-life billionaire philanthropist Bobby Sager.
Bobby Sager Committed to Traveling the World to Make “Concrete Baby Steps”
Deciding to become an extreme philanthropist didn't happen in a single moment, Sager tells Caroline Preston in her June 18, 2009 Chronicle of Philanthropy article “Philanthropy’s Prime Time Player.”
“It was about me in my quest for fullness in my life,” Sager says, “looking at my situation and saying, more money isn't going to give me more return on investment because I already have all that I want that money can buy.”
In 2000, Sager and his wife Elaine took their children Tess and Shane (then ages 8 and 5) out of school and on the road. In the last decade, they have been to the world’s poorest nations practicing what Sager terms “eyeball-to-eyeball” philanthropy.
“I made a lot of money because I knew how to hold people accountable, I knew how to do creative thinking, I knew how to do deals. And I took exactly those same things – especially how to do deals – and I reapplied it to the world and making a difference,” he tells Leesha McKenny in the August 17, 2009 Brisbane Times article “Rich and Rewarding.”
Sager Family Foundation Initiatives
The Sager Family Traveling Foundation & Roadshow website offers a look into the 12 initiatives the family focuses on to invest in leadership and solutions.
- Afghan Women Doctors – a program that works to train healthcare workers and position these women as leaders in the community.
- B-Bobby – a program that helps indigenous communities market their crafts in Western markets at a substantial markup and then return the profit to the community in the form of community development projects.
- Coaches as Mentors – a program in Iraq to help soccer coaches become mentors to their players in both soccer and life.
- Commercial Lending in Palestine – the foundation is a lender in a West Bank microfinance bank that lends to companies, families and investment funds and brokers.
- Lenny Zakim Fund – the foundation supports community activism through this fund that makes small grants to grassroots organizations.
- Liyana – a musical group from Zimbabwe comprised of physically disabled and hearing impaired youth.
- Peace Action Network – a network of members of two organizations, the Young Presidents’ Organization and the World Presidents’ Organization, that holds forums in distressed areas to build bridges.
- Presidents’ Action Net – a member exchange platform for the business leaders that make up the membership of the Young Presidents’ Organization.
- Rwanda Microenterprise – an organization that makes small loans to groups of both Hutus and Tutsis women.
- Teacher Training Center – an effort in Pakistan to hire and train people to educate children traumatized by the 2005 earthquake and its aftermath.
- Science for Tibetan Monks – a workshop to teach Western science to Tibetan Monks to build a framework for an exchange of ideas between the West and Buddhism.
- Venture Capital and Private Equity in Palestine – venture capital investments in businesses in or benefitting the West Bank.
Teddy Rist Isn’t Bobby Sager … Yet
While Bobby Sager is a full-time philanthropist traveling the world with his family, his television alter ego is divorced and on the prowl, jetting off with a cast of characters but always fiercely independent. And while Sager has developed a wise, effective approach to philanthropy and influence, viewers have yet to see Rist do much more than throw money around.
Will Teddy Rist grow into the kind of strategic and effective philanthropist Bobby Sager is? Viewers will have to stay tuned.
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