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Edie Adams

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Edie Adams
Born
Elizabeth Edith Enke
Other namesEdith Adams
OccupationActor
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. Adams, a Tony Award winner, "both embodied and winked at the stereotypes of fetching chanteuse and sexpot blonde."[1]

Career

Adams earned a vocal degree from the Juilliard School of Music and then graduated from Columbia School of Drama. In 1950, winning the "Miss U.S. Television" beauty contest led to an appearance with Milton Berle on his television show.[1]

Adams began working regularly on television with comedian Ernie Kovacs and talk show pioneer Jack Paar. 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?"[1] 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.[1]

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.

Work

Personal life

Adams was born Edith Elizabeth Enke in Kingston, Pennsylvania, and grew up in Tenafly, New Jersey.[2]

Adams married Ernie Kovacs on September 12, 1954, in what was Kovacs second marriage; they remained together until his death in a car accident on January 13, 1962, after which she won a "nasty custody battle" over her stepdaughters, Betty and Kippie.[2] She later had two brief marriages to photographer Martin Mills and trumpeter Pete Candoli. Adams gave birth to two children: a daughter, Mia Kovacs, who was born in 1959 and killed in an automobile accident in 1982, and a son, Joshua Mills.[2]

Adams died in Los Angeles, where she resided, aged 81. According to Josh Mills, the cause of death was cancer and pneumonia.[1][2]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e Weber, Bruce (2008-10-16). "Edie Adams, Actress and Singer (and Flirt With a Cigar), Dies at 81". The New York Times. Retrieved 2008-10-16.
  2. ^ a b c d "Singer, Muriel cigar beauty Edie Adams dies at 81". Associated Press. CNN. Retrieved 2008-10-16.

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