Yvonne DeCarlo has passed away...

Hey folks, Harry here with some bad news. Yvonne DeCarlo has passed away. For film fans and television lovers - this is a sad day. She's probably best known as that hottie that Ol Moses fell for in that Technicolor beauty, THE TEN COMMANDMENTS - or as the wondrous undead Lily Munster. But that's not how she started out - for years in the forties she was just playing eye candy in feature films... a showgirl in THIS GUN FOR HIRE, a handmaiden on the ROAD TO MOROCCO, a girl in a cafe wondering, FOR WHOM THE BELL TOLLS or as Princess Wah-Tah in THE DEERSLAYER (1943). She played Chorus Girls, Secretaries, Handmaiden's, Companions, Office Clerks, Hat Check Girls - until... Film Noir came in where she did the Femme Fatale opposite Burt Lancaster in a pair of the best fucking film noirs around... BRUTE FORCE and CRISS CROSS - and her career had solidified. Suddenly she was playing Calamity Jane and Princess Scheherazade in films. She got to play "larcenous saloon queen" Roxy next to Rock Hudson in SCARLET ANGEL. She was a "B" movie queen - the head lady opposite the Van Helflin's and Edmond O'Brien's and Joel McCrea's and Ricardo Montalbahn's. Handsome well produced films - often times far better than the A films of the period. Just not as heralded. Then - immortality came her way when she landed the role of Sephora in DeMille's THE TEN COMMANDMENTS - a film that will simply never die. One that will ALWAYS play and SHOULD ALWAYS play. She was awesome in the role, not the showiest, but very much the anchor and the heart. Then she was playing with Clark Gable, in my dvd pick this month, BAND OF ANGELS and Victor Mature in TIMBUKTU for Jacques Tourneur! Then with John Wayne in MCLINTOCK! Then the tiny screen a came a-callin' And Lily Munster was born! For 71 episodes of Munster bliss - she had us. I don't know about you, but I loved THE MUNSTERS. And in particular I loved the chemistry between Lily and Herman. She's a big reason why that show has had it's enduring history with us boob tube watchers. After that - Yvonne continued... Playing in anything and everything - from exploitation films like BLAZING STEWARDESSES and SATAN'S CHEERLEADERS and NOCTURNA - to spots on television like ROOTS and FANTASY ISLAND and much more. The last really fun thing she did was on HBO's TALES FROM THE CRYPT series. Remember the episode, DEATH OF SOME SALESMAN? It was that great episode with Ed Begley Jr and Tim Curry in multiple roles. I liked that episode quite a bit, and lit up when I saw Yvonne De Carlo. She's gone now - but I highly recommend checking out her IMDB filmography - and in particular exploring her films from 1946-1964. There's a lot of great work there, be a shame for you to miss it.