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Joan Shawlee

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Joan Shawlee
Shawlee in 1945
Born(1926-03-05)March 5, 1926
Forest Hills, New York, U.S.
DiedMarch 22, 1987(1987-03-22) (aged 61)
Hollywood, California, U.S.
Resting placeRemains scattered at sea
Other namesJoan Fulton
Joyce Ring
OccupationActress
Years active1945–1986
Political partyDemocratic
Spouses
Walter Shawlee
​
​
(m. 1950; div. 1956)​
[1]
Eddie Barchet
​
​
(m. 1958, divorced)​
Children2

Joan Shawlee (née Fulton;[2] March 5, 1926[3] – March 22, 1987) was an American film and television actress. She is known for her recurring role as Fiona "Pickles" Sorrell in The Dick Van Dyke Show, a career-defining turn in Billy Wilder's comedy Some Like It Hot (1959) playing Sweet Sue, the abrasive martinet in charge of Marilyn Monroe's all-girl jazz band, and as the flamboyant Madame Pompey in the 1957 Maverick episode "Stampede" with James Garner. She was sometimes credited under her birth name.

Early years

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Shawlee was born in Forest Hills, New York to Theodore Cuyler Fulton, an automobile salesman, and Esther L. (Ring) Fulton,[4] and she moved with her parents and two brothers, Theodore Cuyler Fulton Jr. and Albert Fulton, to Vancouver, British Columbia[5] when she was five years old.[6]

Career

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Dancing and modeling

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Shawlee studied ballet under Ernest Belcher. At the age of fourteen, she began to work as a model for the John Robert Powers agency in New York, and worked later as a showgirl on Broadway.[6] Billed as Joyce Ring, she appeared in the musical productions By Jupiter (1942) and A Connecticut Yankee (1943).[7]

Film

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A tall woman (5'9"), she was known for small parts in Jack Lemmon and Billy Wilder films. She is probably best remembered for her role as bandleader Sweet Sue in Some Like It Hot (1959) starring Marilyn Monroe, Tony Curtis, and Lemmon. She appeared as Sylvia in The Apartment (1960), and as Amazon Annie in Irma la Douce, both of which starred Lemmon and Shirley MacLaine. She also appeared in Wilder's final film, Buddy Buddy (1981).

Television

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Shawlee had a recurring role on TV in The Dick Van Dyke Show as Fiona "Pickles" Sorrell,[8] wife of writer Maurice "Buddy" Sorrell (Morey Amsterdam). She played the lead in The Adventures of Aggie (1956–57), which ran for only one season.[9]: 20  She played Lorna Peterson on Betty Hutton's short-lived series[9]: 94  Goldie; Margo on the 1976–77 crime drama The Feather and Father Gang;[9]: 338  and Tessie on Joe's World.[9]: 537–538  She was also a regular on The Abbott and Costello Show.[9] She played a dead criminal's wife in Stories of the Century with Jim Davis and a 1957 episode of Maverick titled "Stampede", starring James Garner and Efrem Zimbalist Jr., in which she portrayed the exuberant Madame Pompey. Her final acting appearance was in an episode of Crazy Like a Fox in 1985.

Comedy team

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In the early 1960s, Shawlee and actress Mitzi McCall teamed up as a night club act.[6] They opened at the Club Robaire in Cleveland.[10] In January 1961, syndicated newspaper columnist Dorothy Kilgallen reported that the team was "causing quite a stir", while drawing attention to – and exaggerating – their discrepancy in height: "Joan being six feet, three inches tall and Mitzi four feet, 10 inches short."[11]

Personal life

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Shawlee and her second husband, Eddie Barchet, had a daughter, Angela.[12][6]

Shawlee was a Democrat who was supportive of Adlai Stevenson's campaign during the 1952 presidential election.[13] Shawlee was a practicing Episcopalian.[14]

Death

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Shawlee died of breast cancer, in Hollywood, California, on March 22, 1987, aged 61.[1] She was cremated and her ashes scattered at sea.[15]

Selected filmography and television

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References

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  1. ^ a b Folkart, Burt A. (March 31, 1987). "Joan Shawlee; Busy Actress in Zany Comedies". Los Angeles Times.
  2. ^ "Actress Joan Shawlee Dies of Cancer at 58 [sic]". The Associated Press. March 31, 1987. Miss Shawlee, who also had acted under the name of Joan Fulton ... changed her professional name after her marriage to businessman Walter Shawlee.
  3. ^ Joan Shawlee's date of birth, familysearch.org; accessed February 14, 2016.
  4. ^ "Joan Fulton". My Heritage. Retrieved July 1, 2022.
  5. ^ "Wooster Chapter". Catalog of Beta Theta Pi. J. T. Brown. 1917.
  6. ^ a b c d "Joan Shawlee Sparkles Like a Spring Tonic". The Boston Globe. April 30, 1961. p. 65. Retrieved September 21, 2018 – via Newspapers.com.
  7. ^ "Joyce Ring". Internet Broadway Database. Archived from the original on September 22, 2018. Retrieved September 22, 2018.
  8. ^ Heffernan, Harold (November 9, 1950). "12 New Film Beauties Selected For Musical". The Blade. Toledo, Ohio.
  9. ^ a b c d e Terrace, Vincent (January 10, 2014). Encyclopedia of Television Shows, 1925 through 2010 (2nd ed.). Jefferson, N.C.: McFarland. p. 4. ISBN 978-0-7864-6477-7.
  10. ^ "They're Back". Los Angeles Times. California, Los Angeles. October 20, 1960. p. 54. Retrieved September 22, 2018 – via Newspapers.com. Open access icon
  11. ^ Kilgallen, Dorothy (January 7, 1961). "The Voice of Broadway". The Mercury. Pottstown, Pennsylvania. p. 4. Retrieved September 22, 2018 – via Newspapers.com.
  12. ^ Birth record of Angela Barchet
  13. ^ Motion Picture and Television Magazine. November 1952. page 33. Ideal Publishers.
  14. ^ Morning News, January 10, 1948, Who Was Who in America (Vol. 2)
  15. ^ Wilson, Scott (August 19, 2016). Resting Places: The Burial Sites of More Than 14,000 Famous Persons (3d ed.). McFarland. ISBN 978-1-4766-2599-7 – via Google Books.
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