11.20.2010

WHERE THE STARS DIED IN THE 1960S


Ernie Kovacs 1919-1962

 Legendary innovative television comedian, the epitaph on his grave marker reads "Nothing in Moderation." He is best remembered for creating many of the camera gags and camera techniques that are common today, influencing and inspiring such later shows as Laugh-In, Saturday Night Live, The Today Show, and television hosts like Johnny Carson and David Letterman. See the Map of the accident location

Headline After the Accident

During a rainstorm, he lost control of the car on a curve, and hit a telephone pole. Police found an unlit cigar just out of reach of his arm, and theorized that he lost control while trying to reach for the cigar. When Kovacs died, he owed the US Government several hundred thousand dollars in back taxes (he believed the tax system was unfair, and refused to file his taxes in protest).


Ernie's 1962 Chevrolet Corvair










William Frawley 1887-1966

William Frawley dropped dead on the street of a heart attack in 1966. Frawley, who had played neighbor 'Fred Mertz' in the classic TV show "I Love Lucy" (and 'Bub' on "My Three Sons") had been out to see a movie, and collapsed on his way back. Frawley attended a movie with a "male nurse" and on his way home he dropped dead near the Knickerbocker Hotel. His "nurse" managed to get him into the lobby of the Hotel but they were unable to resuscitate him. The corner where Frawley died was Hollywood Blvd and Ivar Avenue: See Map Here

By almost all accounts, William Frawley's off-screen personality was not all that much different from his on-screen one. A notorious misanthrope, with one brief failed marriage behind him and a fondness for the bottle, he lived in the same spare bachelor apartment for most of his years in Hollywood. Fred You Sexy Thing video is a HOOT!

Lenny Bruce (Leonard Alfred Schneider) 1925-1966

American stand-up comedian and unbelievably brilliant satirist, who invented controversal humor due to his use of so-called 'dirty words' in his nightclub comedy act. Bruce's dark humor and largely improvised shows often pushed the envelope of what was in 1960s thought of as respectable. Bruce's performances, bravery at breaking the norm, influenced many many comedians to follow.

In his later life, Bruce became addicted to heroin. In 1963 he was found guilty of illegal possession of drugs. Bruce died of an overdose on August 3, 1966, in his home located at 8825 W. Hollywood Boulevard, West Hollywood: See the Map Lenny Bruce on Find a Death 




Nick Adams Born Nicholas Adamschock to a coal-mining family in Nanticoke, Pennsylvania, on July 10, 1931, Nick Adams' early life was hard-scrabble, as it was with many Depression-era families. Adams made his motion picture debut in the Warner Bros. western Strange Lady in Town (1955; with Greer Garson and Dana Andrews) and followed this up by landing a role in Mister Roberts (1955; with Henry Fonda), a strong beginning for his career.

He continued this streak in Rebel Without a Cause (1955; with James Dean) and Our Miss Brooks (1956; with Eve Arden). After a slew of movie roles and appearances on television, Adams was cast in the lead role in the ABC television western The Rebel (1959-1961). A total of 78 episodes were shot before ABC pulled the plug on the show in 1961.


2126 El Roble Lane, West Los Angeles: the home where Nick Adams (star of TV's "The Rebel") died of an apparent overdose in 1968. However, there were no open pill bottles, needles, or any other drug-related items found at the scene, so his death remains something of a mystery. Read the Mysterious Death of Nick Adams. See Map of his Beverly Hills Home Where The Stars Died Website Find A Death Read More on RK Who Killed Bobby Fuller? Supreme Loss Flo Ballard Story Patsy Cline's Plane Crash Sam Cooke Death at the Hacienda Hotel Marilyn Monroe Found Dead

2 comments:

Paul Nagel said...

big fan of ernie kovacs...remember watching with my dad.

Fast Film said...

Ernie Kovacs is the "iggy and the stooges" of televised comedy: it timelessly holds up so well because it was the first to do aspects now part of the canon.

We only have his treasures to view today by an odd accident. Most all television was erased to recycle the tapes, escept for occasional kinoscope documentation (a movie camera trained on a tv camera.)

A viewer contacted Kovacs' widow Edie Adams saying she figured Ms. Adams had all the Kovac shows anyway, but would she like an extra copy of everything? The viewer wrote that she'd found a complete set of Kovacs kinoscopes in the estate of her late husband, an early tv production crew guy. This actually turned out to be the only known set of Kovacs tv work.

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