Fay Wray R.I.P.

August 9, 2004 1:49 PM

She has screamed her last. Fay Wray has died at the age of 96. Which pretty much rules out her having a cameo in Peter Jackson's remake of King Kong.
posted by Man-Thing (20 comments total)

I would never have imagined she was still alive.
posted by smackfu at 1:56 PM on August 9, 2004

she lived a long time. Good for her!

Whatever happened to Fay Wray? She went apeshit.
/Rocky Horror ref
posted by amberglow at 2:00 PM on August 9, 2004

ah, King Kong's first love. she acted for Stroheim, too, but she'll be remembered for the monkey movie -- Stroheim was the coolest man alive, but how can you compete with a giant gorilla and a skyscraper?

she was Canadian, by the way
posted by matteo at 2:14 PM on August 9, 2004

Which pretty much rules out her having a cameo in Peter Jackson's remake of King Kong.

There's a Python sketch about postmortem cameos by Marilyn Monroe that I could reference here, but that would be tasteless.
posted by PinkStainlessTail at 2:19 PM on August 9, 2004

Alberta, no less - the *coolest* of the Canadian provinces, IMO.

Fay Wray will live forever thanks to that movie and that ape (gorilla?).
posted by davidmsc at 2:19 PM on August 9, 2004

She recently was interviewed in the documentary Broadway: The Golden Age, and the reaction of the audiences I saw it with was clearly "She's alive?!" Alas.
posted by Epenthesis at 2:38 PM on August 9, 2004

I took a tour last year of Central Park and was told by a guide that she has an apartment overlooking the park. I had the same reaction, "she's still alive?!?" There's a beautiful apartment on Manhattan's Lower West Side opening up today. If she had rent control, she was probably paying $50/month for it too.
posted by graventy at 2:58 PM on August 9, 2004

There's a Python sketch about postmortem cameos by Marilyn Monroe that I could reference here, but that would be tasteless.

Indeed.

Interviewer: Ah, what sorts of things does she do in the film?

Carl French: Well, we had her lying on beds, lying on floors, falling out of cupboards, scaring the children, ahm...
posted by Ty Webb at 3:19 PM on August 9, 2004

This rent control... tell me more about it.
posted by toby\flat2 at 4:01 PM on August 9, 2004

What a week. I'm just imagining that somewhere in heaven there's an almighty party going on with Fay Wray, Rick James, Cartier Bresson and Bernard Levin. Now that's a party I'd like to be at (though withour dying obviously).
posted by ciderwoman at 4:09 PM on August 9, 2004

Does this mean my generation can take our fingers out of our ears, now?

Huh?

What?
posted by dayvin at 4:12 PM on August 9, 2004

on one of the 'making of' pieces in the recently released 'Indiana Jones' trilogy on DVD, Steven Spielberg is heard saying that when he was directing Kate Capshaw he acknowledged the greatest scream of all belongs to Fay Wray.
posted by NationalKato at 4:24 PM on August 9, 2004

Did he acknowledge that the worst acting of all belonged to his wife?
posted by bingo at 5:25 PM on August 9, 2004

Which pretty much rules out her having a cameo in Peter Jackson's remake of King Kong

Which pretty much rules out her having a cameo in Peter Jackson's remake of King Kong

Oh, come on. Andy Serkis + Ms. Wray = Fay Fée, as I'm sure you'll agree.
posted by mwhybark at 5:51 PM on August 9, 2004

D'oh - cut and past to get around a special character nasty, sorry.
posted by mwhybark at 5:52 PM on August 9, 2004

oh, and dayvin: I can't hear you - I have a banana in my ear!
posted by mwhybark at 5:53 PM on August 9, 2004

Did he acknowledge that the worst acting of all belonged to his wife?

You said it. She comes close to making that movie unwatchable, and I fucking love me some Indy.
posted by Ty Webb at 6:46 PM on August 9, 2004

Whatever happened to Fay Wray?

Damn! Beat me to it. But as I remember the response was "She died!"

King Kong was the first movie I was allowed to stay up late to see when I was 8 or 9. And about that time I learned to sing the Bobby Pickett song.

King Kong! King Kong! The white man done you wrong! And so we sing this song to you--mighty Kong! Hunga! Hunga! Hunga! Kong!

God bless Fay Wray and God bless Lily St. Cyr!
posted by octobersurprise at 8:44 PM on August 9, 2004

How it clung to her thigh!

Life, that is. I don't mind hearing about these icon deaths quite as much when they've lived to a ripe old age like 96.
posted by scarabic at 9:49 PM on August 9, 2004

"Which pretty much rules out her having a cameo in Peter Jackson's remake"

I wouldn't be so sure... my precious.
posted by Civil_Disobedient at 8:16 AM on August 10, 2004