Mitzi McCall was an actress and comedian known for roles on such TV shows as “Seinfeld,” “Life Goes On,” and “Alright Already,” and for her appearance on an iconic episode of “The Ed Sullivan Show.”
- Died: August 8, 2024 (Who else died on August 8?)
- Details of death: Died at a hospital in Burbank, California at the age of 93.
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Mitzi McCall’s legacy
McCall got her start as an entertainer in the 1950s, appearing in her hometown of Pittsburgh on the local children’s show “Kiddie Castle” and in movies like “You’re Never Too Young” and “Machine Gun Kelly.” She met her future husband, Charlie Brill, while enrolled in the Jerry Lewis Comedy Workshop, and the two began developing a comedy act together. In 1962, they had their big break with an opportunity to bring their act to a national audience on “The Ed Sullivan Show.”
Not only was “The Ed Sullivan Show” a wildly popular program with a guaranteed wide reach; McCall and Brill were scheduled on one of its most iconic nights: February 9, 1964, when The Beatles were featured in their first U.S. TV appearance. The pop superstars opened and closed the show, with several other entertainers in between their sets. McCall and Brill came on last before the Beatles’ closing set, and the audience of Beatles fans was beyond impatient. They had little interest in the young comics, and their performance received few laughs – though McCall got one when she threw out an improvised line about stepping on a beetle. McCall and Brill were sure their careers were over after the high-profile bomb.
As it turned out, the 1964 appearance did put a hitch in their careers, but it certainly didn’t ruin them. They continued working together as a duo for years, including a regular run as “The Fun Couple” on “Rowan & Martin’s Laugh-In,” and they remained married until McCall’s death. And she continued a busy career in movies, TV, and voice acting.
McCall was a star of the 1997-’98 single-season sitcom “Alright Already,” and she had a recurring role on “Life Goes On” as waitress Midge. She appeared with Brill on “Silk Stalkings,” in which he starred as Capt. Harry Lipschitz; she played his character’s wife, Frannie, in a recurring role. McCall played a pivotal role in a memorable episode of “Seinfeld,” appearing as a dry cleaner’s wife, who wore Jerry’s mom’s fur coat. She appeared in a few episodes each of “Port Charles” and “7th Heaven.” Also a prolific voice actress, McCall voiced such characters as Penny Pillar on “The Flintstone Comedy Hour” and other Flintstones shows; Ammonia Pine on “Darkwing Duck,” multiple voices on “The Fonz and the Happy Days Gang,” Mother Goose on “Mother Goose and Grimm,” and many others.
McCall on her “Ed Sullivan Show” appearance
“The Beatles were amazing. And in my nervousness onstage, I ad-libbed: ‘You know, I was just backstage, and I stepped on a beetle.’” — from a 2014 interview for the New York Post
Tributes to Mitzi McCall
Full obituary: The Hollywood Reporter
