RIP Tony Curtis

One of those guys you thought might go on forever in the public eye. He was 85.

Unfortunately, the AP story I'm linking here refers to his daughter as Jamie Leigh Curtis. Unless that's the real spelling of her middle name in homage to her mother, but I doubt it.

http://www.thestar.com/entertainment/article/868349--actor-tony-curtis-dies-at-85?bn=1

I'm far too young to have seen him in his prime, but I do remember him playing a prehistoric version of himself, "Stony Curtis," in The Flintstones.

 

His best work was producing his daughter.

 

"Sweet Smell of Success" was a great movie, and a lot of people rave about "Some Like it Hot," though I never really cared for it (I just don't find cross-dressing all that funny).

But his most enduring legacy, other than his daughter, was that Elvis died his hair black as an homage to Curtis.

 

sorry, but it is "leigh" for jamie's mom, the gorgeous janet leigh.
yup. for jamie's mom, the janet

 

Nope.

Jamie Lee Curtis.

http://www.amazon.com/My-Mommy-Hung-Moon-Story/dp/0060290161/ref=sr_1_1?s=gateway&ie=UTF8&qid=1285853947&sr=8-1

 

Gotta give him credit for "The Defiant Ones" as well. R.I.P.

 

Did okay in Spartacus. Never did make it clear to Laurence Olivier whether he liked snails or oysters.

 

I keep thinking of the Flintstones episode where he does the voice-over for Stoney Curtis ...

 

i googled myself and stand corrected, though she's i.d.'d as "jamie 'leigh' curtis" in several posts. i could swear i read an article after "trading places" came out in which she explained "jamie leigh curtis" was the ideal way for her parents to get both last name on the birth certificat in the era before hyphenated last names. guess i "misrembered" or misread, though i'm sure it's more than sheer coincidence she was named "jamie lee," regardless of the spelling.

but if i'm wrong, so be it. i'll deal.

 

Her older sister is named Kelly Lee Curtis. My understanding is that both girls were named in utero so their parents, who obviously didn't know if they were having girls or boys, wouldn't have to worry about names once they were born.

Kelly and Jamie obviously work as names for both genders. Lee does too....Leigh, however, isn't quite as common for a boy, though. Maybe that's why Tony and Janet went with the Lee spelling instead of Leigh.

 

He and Roger Moore were pretty good in "The Pretenders," a campy TV show from the early 1970s.

 

RIP Bernie Schwartz


Tony Curtis appears on sleeve of The Beatles' "Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band"