Steve Lawrence, winner of multiple Grammy and Emmy Awards, has died at age 88. He passed away due to complications with Alzheimer’s, which he was diagnosed with back in 2019. Lawrence has left behind a decades-long career in acting, comedy, writing, and music, most of which he shared with his late wife, Eydie Gormé, who died in 2013 of an unknown illness; together, they formed the pop duo Steve & Eydie, who released multiple chart-topping singles throughout the 60s and 70s. Individually, Steve Lawrence is also known for decades of roles in movies like The Blues Brothers and its sequel.
Steve Lawrence, Half of “Steve & Eydie,” Dies of Alzheimer’s
Steve Lawrence got his start in stardom at just 18 years old, when he was hired by Steve Allen to be a singer on Allen’s NYC late-night show, along with Andy Williams and his future wife, Eydie. Allen’s show was picked up by NBC in 1954, becoming the first iteration of The Tonight Show, and Lawrence, Gormé, and Williams would stay with the show until it ended in 1957, the same year Steve and Eydie were married. Not long after that, in the late 50s, Steve Lawrence was drafted into the U.S. Army and served as the vocal soloist for the United States Army Band “Pershing’s Own.”
Lawrence then began climbing in his solo career in the late 1950s, with chart-topping hits like “Go Away Little Girl,” “Party Doll,” “Footsteps,” and “Pretty Blue Eyes.” In 1958, Lawrence and Gormé appeared on the summer replacement show, The Steve Lawrence and Eydie Gormé Show. Together, the husband and wife duo would win a 1979 Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Comedy-Variety or Music Program for “Steve & Eydie Celebrate Irving Berlin.”
Steve Lawrence: The Big & Small Screens
In 1980, Steve Lawrence would star in The Blues Brothers as Maury Sline, the manager for brothers Jake and Elwood J. Blues, played by John Belushi and Dan Akyroyd. He would reprise the role for the film’s sequel, Blues Brothers 2000, released in 1998. Between 1995 and 1999, Lawrence would also make several appearances on The Nanny, both as himself and as the mysterious father of protagonist Fran Fine (Fran Drescher).
Throughout the 2000s, Steve Lawrence would make guest appearances on Diagnosis Murder, CSI, The Clearner, as as Jack, Betty White’s love interest in Hot in Cleveland (2011). Eydie, his wife of 55 years, passed away in August 2013 after a brief unknown illness. In 2019, Steve Lawrence admitted that he had been diagnosed with the early stages of Alzheimer’s disease but reported that his treatment was going well. Unfortunately, he eventually lost his battle with the disease and passed away yesterday in Los Angeles, CA.
Steve Lawrence is survived by his son David Nessim Lawrence, an ASCAP Award-winning composer responsible for the score from High School Musical.
