Friday, October 23, 2009

RIP Soupy Sales


From the AP:

Soupy Sales, the rubber-faced comedian whose anything-for-a-chuckle career was built on 20,000 pies to the face and 5,000 live TV appearances across a half-century of laughs, died Thursday. He was 83.

Sales died at Calvary Hospice in the Bronx, New York, said his former manager and longtime friend, Dave Usher. Sales had many health problems and entered the hospice last week, Usher said.

At the peak of his fame in the 1950s and '60s, Sales was one of the best-known faces in the nation, Usher said.

"If President Eisenhower would have walked down the street, no one would have recognized him as much as Soupy," said Usher.

At the same time, Sales retained an openness to fans that turned every restaurant meal into an endless autograph-signing session, Usher said.

"He was just good to people," said Usher, a former jazz music producer who managed Sales in the 1950s and now owns Detroit-based Marine Pollution Control.

2 comments:

  1. He will be sadly missed. My uncle David Brackove worked with him in Germany on BFBS and said he was a perfect gentleman. RIP
    Sandra x

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  2. Soupy Sales: comedic genius, RIP. A lot of his mannerisms and energy reminds me of Dick van Dyke actually... the two even looked alike

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