James Darren, the previous teen idol and pop singer who performed the dreamy surfer Moondoggie in three Gidget motion pictures earlier than starring on tv on The Time Tunnel and T.J. Hooker, died Monday. He was 88.
Darren died in his sleep at Cedars-Sinai Medical Heart in Los Angeles, his son Jim Moret, a correspondent for Inside Version, informed The Hollywood Reporter. He had entered the hospital for an aortic valve alternative however was deemed too weak to have the surgical procedure; he went house however needed to return.
“I at all times thought he would pull via,” Moret mentioned, “as a result of he was so cool. He was at all times cool.”
Early in his profession, the dark-haired Darren obtained wonderful notices for starring in Let No Man Write My Epitaph (1960) — portraying the son of a hoodlum defended by Humphrey Bogart’s character in 1949’s Knock on Any Door — and for taking part in the Greek soldier Spyros Pappadimos in The Weapons of Navarone (1961).
Despite the fact that he couldn’t surf, the Philadelphia native obtained the function of Moondoggie (actual title: Jerry Matthews) reverse three actresses because the precocious Malibu teen: Sandra Dee in Gidget (1959), Deborah Walley in Gidget Goes Hawaiian (1961) and Cindy Carol in Gidget Goes to Rome (1963).
Darren revived his singing profession within the late ’90s when he appeared on a number of episodes of the syndicated collection Star Trek: Deep House 9 because the holographic lounge singer Vic Fontaine, a task he referred to as “probably the most satisfying” he ever performed.
A number of of his Frank Sinatra-styled performances have been recorded for the 1999 album This One’s From the Coronary heart.
After a few years out of the limelight, Darren made an impression because the husband of a bar proprietor in Harry Dean Stanton‘s remaining movie, Fortunate (2017).
James William Ercolani was born on June 8, 1936. Rising up on South tenth Avenue in South Philadelphia, he was impressed by one other Philly native, Eddie Fisher, to turn into a singer and actor, and he commuted to New York to review performing with Stella Adler.
Whereas within the metropolis, the proprietor of a pictures store related him to Columbia Footage expertise scout Joyce Selznick (David O. Selznick’s niece), and he went on to signal a contract with the studio.
Darren made his movie debut as a highschool senior and gang member reverse Robert Blake within the crime drama Rumble on the Docks (1956), then adopted with roles in Operation Mad Ball, The Brothers Rico and The Tijuana Story in 1957 and Gunman’s Stroll in ’58.
The Gidget motion pictures made him extraordinarily standard with younger women.
“The defining second was after I was at a studio in San Francisco and phrase obtained out that I used to be there,” he recalled in a 2015 interview with Los Angeles journal. “1000’s of women have been screaming out entrance. Once I needed to go away the constructing, they tackled me to the bottom and pulled items of my hair out. The police needed to rescue me and took me to the roof till issues settled down.”
To land the Gidget gig, Darren needed to persuade the producers that he may carry a tune. “They have been going to make use of anyone else’s voice, however I informed them I may sing,” he mentioned. “We went into one of many soundstages with a piano participant and I sang the music and so they mentioned, ‘He can do it.’ Then they put me on their label, Colpix.”
Darren additionally was heard performing in All of the Younger Males (1960), Diamond Head (1962), Underneath the Yum Yum Tree (1963) and For These Who Suppose Younger (1964).
He sang “Virtually in Your Arms” on the 1959 Academy Awards and “It’s a Mad Mad Mad Mad World” on the 1964 Oscar telecast; carried out as Yogi Bear in a 1964 animated movie; and did a quantity on a 1965 episode of The Flintstones.
He additionally performed one of the best buddy reverse Sal Mineo in The Gene Krupa Story (1959), starred as a automobile mechanic in The Full of life Set (1964) and ventured to Italy to topline Venus in Furs (1969) with Barbara McNair.
Darren was married to childhood sweetheart Gloria Terlitsky from 1955 till their 1958 divorce and to Evy Norlund, a former Miss Denmark, from 1960 till his dying. He lived for many years in a house on Kimridge Highway in Beverly Ridge Estates that had been owned by Audrey Hepburn.
Along with his spouse and Moret, survivors embody his different sons, Christian and Anthony; grandchildren Amanda, Carly, Matthew, Natalie and Nicholas; and goddaughter A.J. Lambert, daughter of Nancy Sinatra.
Over time, Darren encountered many followers of his music, a few of them sudden.
“I used to be in a pizza store at some point with a buddy of mine. I heard this bike pull up, and in walked Bruce Springsteen in his little bike cap, like Brando wore in The Wild One — I assume he left his helmet outdoors,” he recalled in his chat with Weaver. “I mentioned, ‘Oh, I gotta go say hello to him.’
“I walked as much as him and mentioned, ‘Hello, I don’t wish to interrupt you, however my title is James Darren. I simply wish to inform you I’m an enormous fan. I like all of your stuff.’ And he mentioned, ‘James Darren? I purchased “Goodbye Merciless World” in Freehold, New Jersey.’ Isn’t that candy?”
–Duane Byrge contributed to this report
This text was initially printed by The Hollywood Reporter.
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