From the Guardian · · 1m 30s
Elke Sommer, Pink Panther star, dies aged 85
The German actor who became a Hollywood bombshell in the 1960s and 70s has died in Los Angeles of heart failure.
In brief
The German actor who became a Hollywood bombshell in the 1960s and 70s has died in Los Angeles of heart failure. Elke Sommer, the German actor who starred in A Shot in the Dark and And Then There Were None, has died aged eighty five in Los Angeles of heart failure. Originally reported by the Guardian.
German star dies in Los Angeles
Elke Sommer, the prolific German actor known for A Shot in the Dark and And Then There Were None, has died aged eighty five.Bild magazine reported that Sommer died in Los Angeles of heart failure.
From Berlin to Hollywood
Born Elke Schletz in nineteen forty in Berlin, the daughter of a Protestant pastor, Sommer was evacuated to Bavaria during the war.
Breakthrough with Paul Newman
With her gift for languages, Sommer made her first English film in nineteen sixty one.
Peak years in the sixties and seventies
Sommer's career took off with A Shot in the Dark, where she leaned into her sexpot image as a maid suspected of murders.
Horror films and British comedies
In the nineteen seventies, Sommer appeared in cult horror films by Mario Bava including Baron Blood and Lisa and the Devil.
Later life and legal victory
After scaling back screen appearances to concentrate on painting, Sommer became embroiled in a feud with Zsa Zsa Gabor after appearing together on TV show Circus of the Stars in the mid nineteen eighties.
The bottom line
Elke Sommer, the German actor who starred in A Shot in the Dark and And Then There Were None, has died aged eighty five in Los Angeles of heart failure.
