Edie Adams

Edie Adams
Born	Elizabeth Edith Enke
Other names	Edith Adams
Occupation	Actor
Spouse(s)	Ernie Kovacs (1954-1962) Marty Mills (1964) Pete Candoli (1972-1989)

Edie Adams (April 16, 1927 – October 15, 2008) was an American singer, Broadway, television and film actress and comedienne.

Biography

Born Edith Elizabeth Enke in Kingston, Pennsylvania to Adams earned a vocal degree from the Juilliard School of Music and then graduated from Columbia School of Drama, and in 1950 won the "Miss U.S. Television" beauty contest. This led to an appearance on the Milton Berle Show and lauched Adams's television career.

Adams began working regularly on television with comedian Ernie Kovacs and talk show pioneer Jack Paar. Kovacs and Adams married on September 12, 1954 and remained together until his death in a car accident on January 13, 1962. They had a daughter, Mia Susan, who was also killed in a car accident (in 1982) at the age of 22. Kovacs was a noted cigar smoker, and Edie did a long-running series of TV commercials for Muriel Cigars. She remained the pitch-lady for Muriel well after Kovacs' death, intoning in a Mae West style and sexy outfit, "Why don't you pick one up and smoke it sometime?" Another commercial for Muriel cigars, which cost ten cents at the time, showed the alluring Adams singing, "Hey, big spender, spend a little dime with me." Kovacs' network, ABC, gave Edie a chance with her own show, Here's Edie, which received five Emmy nominations but lasted only one-season. Edie made sporadic appearances through the decades on television, including on Fantasy Island, The Love Boat, Murder, She Wrote and Designing Women.

Adams married actor-photographer Marty Mills in 1964. He was the father of her surviving child, Josh Mills. The marriage ended in divorce. Her third, and last, marriage was to noted jazz trumpet player Pete Candoli, which lasted from 1972 until their separation in 1977. They divorced in 1989. They toured and performed together, with Candoli serving as her music director.

Adams starred on Broadway in Wonderful Town (1953) opposite Rosalind Russell (winning the Theatre World Award), and as Daisy Mae in Li'l Abner (1956), winning the Tony Award for Best Featured Actress in a Musical. She played the Fairy Godmother in Rodgers and Hammerstein's original 1957 Cinderella broadcast. She played supporting roles in several well-known films in the 1960s, including "Miss Olsen" in The Apartment (1960). In 2003, as one of the last surviving headliners from the all-star movie, It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World, she joined actors Marvin Kaplan and Sid Caesar at 40th anniversary celebrations of the movie. She was also a favorite nightclub headliner. Adams "both embodied and winked at the stereotypes of fetching chanteuse and sexpot blonde".

She died of cancer and pneumonia in Los Angeles, where she resided, aged 81.

Work

Television

• Ernie in Kovacsland (1951) (canceled after 2 months)
• The Ernie Kovacs Show (1952–1956)
• Cinderella (1957)
• Lucy Meets the Moustache (1960)
• Take a Good Look (panelist from 1960–1961)
• Here's Edie (1963–1964)
• Evil Roy Slade (1972)
• Cop on the Beat (1975)
• Superdome (1978)
• Fast Friends (1979)
• The Seekers (1979)
• Make Me an Offer (1980)
• Portrait of an Escort (1980)
• A Cry for Love (1980)
• The Haunting of Harrington House (1981)
• As the World Turns (cast member in 1982)
• Shooting Stars (1983)
• Ernie Kovacs: Between the Laughter (1984)
• Adventures Beyond Belief (1987)
• Jake Spanner, Private Eye (1989)
• Tales of the City (1993) (miniseries)

Filmography

• Showdown at Ulcer Gulch (1956)
• The Apartment (1960)
• Lover Come Back (1961)
• Call Me Bwana (1963)
• Under the Yum Yum Tree (1963)
• It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World (1963)
• Love with the Proper Stranger (1963)
• The Best Man (1964)
• Made in Paris (1966)
• The Oscar (1966)
• The Honey Pot (1967)
• Up in Smoke (1978)
• Racquet (1979)
• The Happy Hooker Goes Hollywood (1980)
• Boxoffice (1982)
• Broadway: The Golden Age, by the Legends Who Were There (2003)

External links

• Please use a more specific IBDB template. See the documentation for available templates.
• "Ernie Kovacs Tribute Site". erniekovacs.net.
• Obituary in Los Angeles Times

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