Golden Globe winner and international sex symbol Elke Sommer – known for her on-screen romance with Jacques Clouseau in the “Pink Panther” franchise – has died of heart failure – a week before her 86th birthday.
Sommer, 85, “died peacefully around 10 p.m.” on Wednesday at her home in the Bel Air neighborhood of Los Angeles, her stepson Sebastian Walther told German media outlet Bild, and her death comes three months after her 32-year-old husband, Wolf Walther, lost his battle with cancer.
“Now she can finally be with her beloved husband again,” Sebastian Walther added about the actress.
Berlin-born Sommer’s acting career spanned approximately 58 years – with her last credited acting role coming in 2017.
However, the actress stepped away from the spotlight in recent years and found herself bedridden in recent months before her death – which Bild reports is believed to be due to heart failure. She would have been 86 years old on November 5.
Sommer was born in the Nazi Reich in November 1940 – a year after the start of World War II in Europe – and she initially did not plan to pursue a career in Hollywood, according to Bild.
She wanted to become an interpreter and spoke six languages by the time she was a teenager.
However, her acting break would come after she won the Italian Miss Viareggio beauty pageant at the age of 17 while on vacation in the Mediterranean country in 1958.
She was spotted by Italian director Vittorio De Sica before starring in Italian comedies, one of which was called “Men and Nobles”.
Sommer starred in several Italian and German films in the early 1960s before landing a role in the Mark Robson-directed film “The Prize” – which starred Paul Newman and Edward G. Robinson.
She received a Golden Globe in 1964 where she was named Most Promising Newcomer.
But one of the actress’s most recognizable acting roles came in the 1964 comedy “A Shot in the Dark” — the second installment in the “Pink Panther” film franchise.
Sommer played maid Maria Gambrelli who was framed for the murder of driver Miguel Ostros before having a sexual affair with Inspector Jacques Clouseau – who was played by “Dr. Strangelove” star Peter Sellers.
She even refused to reprise her role in the 1993 film “Son of the Pink Panther” because Sellers had already died, according to IMDB. Sellers died in 1980.
Sommer was also known for her roles in the Russell Rouse-directed film “The Oscar” and the 1968 film “The Wrecking Crew” – the latter starring “King of Cool” Dean Martin.
She hasn’t just made a name for herself on the big screen. She was featured in three Playboy shoots in September 1964, December 1967 and September 1970.
During a July 1969 interview with the National Police Gazette, she admitted to painting nude on a hillside outside her Beverly Hills home.
“It’s the best way to get a tan all over,” she joked according to the article, which described her as “Hollywood’s No. 1 Nudist.”
Off-screen, Sommer has been married twice. She married famous Hollywood columnist Joe Hyams in 1964 – before divorcing in 1981.
Hyams said his marriage was “the best 17 years of (his) life” and that he had “no regrets,” UPI reported in December 1981.
“When we got married 17 years ago, no one thought our marriage would last long,” he added.
She met Wolf Walther, who would later become her husband of 32 years, in 1989 when she was cast in the play “Tamara.”
“I was in New York to star in ‘Tamara’ and I had to stay there for four months,” she told Classic Film TV Cafe, reflecting on how the couple met.
“So I had to find an apartment but they were horribly expensive, tiny and noisy. As I knew the general manager of the Essex House, I wanted to talk to him about renting a room but the hotel had a new general manager, a man called Wolf Walther. So we met. For him it was love at first sight.
“For me it took a little longer, but not much longer. »
Wolf Walther died in July from cancer – and Sommer’s friend Erwin Schneider told Bild: “She could never have imagined a life without her beloved ‘Papa Bear’.”
“Now Elke was finally able to join him,” said Schneider, a Munich-based photographer.
Gn entert
