Nanette Fabray (1920-2018)
Nanette Fabray filled a very big spotlight role when she took over from Imogene Coca as Sid Caesar's distaff sidekick in the program that succeeded the original "Show of Shows" in the mid-1950s. Called, "Caesar's Hour", it sought to rekindle the magic of live, skit comedy that was television's life blood until the arrival of videotape extinguished its necessity and, IMO, much of its immediacy. Miss Fabray was a game playmate and foil to Caesar's unpredictable, bombastic, Type A personality; where he was hot, she demonstrated coolness and like Miss Coca before her, often as not, did it in a cocktail dress and heels. And, not to put too fine a point on it, she was very pretty.
Her career faded not long after Caesar left television for good at the end of the decade, but, Miss Fabray's cachet was such that her niece, Shelley Faberes, was able to garner a coveted and long-running role as the daughter in Donna Reed's eponymous tv show family.
Most millennials, if they recognize her at all, will be from the one film everyone remembers her making, "The Bandwagon" (1953) where Miss Fabray co-starred as the female half of another show-biz partnership, this time, the fictional husband and wife song-writing team of Lily and Lester Marten. It was one of the last MGM musicals to star Fred Astaire and it was a sensation. Here she is in one of the film's signature songs:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=12&v=ik8igCUb2i8
Take a bow, Miss Fabray.
Her career faded not long after Caesar left television for good at the end of the decade, but, Miss Fabray's cachet was such that her niece, Shelley Faberes, was able to garner a coveted and long-running role as the daughter in Donna Reed's eponymous tv show family.
Most millennials, if they recognize her at all, will be from the one film everyone remembers her making, "The Bandwagon" (1953) where Miss Fabray co-starred as the female half of another show-biz partnership, this time, the fictional husband and wife song-writing team of Lily and Lester Marten. It was one of the last MGM musicals to star Fred Astaire and it was a sensation. Here she is in one of the film's signature songs:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=12&v=ik8igCUb2i8
Take a bow, Miss Fabray.