Ed Ames first rose to fame as the lead singer of the Ames Brothers, a chart-topping group that predated the rise of rock ‘n’ roll, then became Fess Parker’s Indian companion on NBC’s hit show. He turned to acting as a role. “Daniel Boone” He died Sunday at his home in Beverly Hills, Calif., at the age of 95.
His wife Jean (Arnold) Ames said the cause was Alzheimer’s disease.
It was a family affair that brought Mr. Ames into the spotlight. With its smooth, clean harmonies, the Ames brothers Ed, Gene, Joe, and Vic have played his 50s from the late 1940s, right down to the pre-World War I college song (“Sigma His Chee Lover”). The record was a hit in the latter half of the 1980s. ) to folk songs (“Goodnight Irene”) to love songs (“I Love You for Sentimental Reasons”). This quartet scored his double-sided number one hit in 1950. “Sentimental Me” and “rag mop” their “You, you, you” held the top spot for eight weeks in 1953 and remained on the charts for almost eight months. Overall, the Ames Brothers have sold over 20 million of his records.
The Ames Brothers have performed at major venues including Chilo’s in Hollywood and The Roxy in New York. They made regular Las Vegas and television appearances, guesting with Milton Berle, Perry Como, Jackie Gleason and Ed Sullivan. In 1956 they broadcast their own television series. In 1958, Billboard magazine named them Vocal Group of the Year.
But by 1960, Ed Ames had had enough.
“I thought if I had to sing the same song again, it would come out of my skull,” he said in 1964. boring. “His brothers continued their nightclub tour without him.
After taking acting lessons, Ames landed an Off-Broadway role in Arthur Miller’s “The Crucible” for $50 a week. He made his Broadway debut as an understudy for Jerry Orbach in the 1961 musical Carnival!.
He also continued recording. As a solo artist, “Try to Remember” (1965), “Time Time” (1967), “My Cup Runnes Over” (1967), “Who Will Answer?” released a hit song. (1968).
Ames also starred in the 1963 Broadway production of One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, adapted by Dale Wasserman from the Ken Kesey novel. He played Chief Bromden, an American Indian patient in a psychiatric hospital, who pretended to be dumb and eventually led to the protagonist, Kirk Douglas (later Jack Nicholson in the film). It would suffocate the rebellious Randall Patrick McMurphy he played. of mercy.
It won’t be the last time Ames plays a Native American.
His performance in ‘The Cuckoo’s Nest’ led to his most famous role, namely opposite Fess Parker in the movie ‘The Cuckoo’s Nest’. “Daniel Boone” Mingo, the son of an Oxford-educated Cherokee woman and a British aristocrat, accompanies Boone on his Tennessee frontier expeditions. (Mingo’s father was the Earl of Dunmore, but rather than claim the title, Mingo chose to remain a member of the Cherokee Nation.)
Ames played Mingo in the first four of the show’s six seasons, from 1964 to 1968. But his most memorable moment during that time wasn’t “Daniel Boone.” It was April 29, 1965, when he appeared as Johnny Carson’s guest on “The Tonight Show.”
In this section, which quickly became a staple of The Tonight Show’s highlight reels, Mr. Ames used a rudimentary drawing of a sheriff on a wood panel as a target to direct Mr. Carson to a Tomahawk. I started teaching how to throw. He threw a tomahawk across the stage.When it was planted precisely in the sheriff’s crotch, the audience I kept laughing out loud in response.
Mr. Ames tried to retrieve the Tomahawk, but Mr. Carson grabbed Mr. Ames’ arm. As the laughter subsided again, Mr. Carson looked at Mr. Ames and said, “I didn’t even know you were Jewish.”
there was him
Ed Ames was born on July 9, 1927, in Malden, Massachusetts, to Ukrainian Jewish immigrants David Urich and Sarah (Zaslavskaya) Urich, as the youngest of nine surviving children, Edmond Born as Dantes Ulic. As teenagers, Ed and his three brothers formed a singing group and won a Boston-area amateur contest.
Initially billed as the Urich Brothers and then the Amory Brothers, they signed to Coral Records and became the Ames Brothers. After moving to RCA Records in 1953, he began releasing hit songs.
Ed was the last surviving member of the Ames brothers. Vic died in 1978, Gene in 1997 and Joe in 2007. His first marriage to Sarah Caxeiro ended in divorce. In addition to his wife, whom he married in 1998, he has two children from his first marriage, Ronald and Sonya. Stepson Stephen Saviano. He has 7 grandchildren. and five great-grandchildren. His daughter Marcella Ames predeceased him.
In the 1980s and 90s, Mr. Ames appeared in regional productions of musicals such as “South Pacific”, “Man of La Mancha” and “Carousel”. He also made occasional television appearances, and she appeared as herself in Murder, She Wrote, In the Heat of the Night, and the sitcom It’s Garry Shandling’s Show.
Former Times reporter Dennis Hebesi died in 2017. Shivani Gonzalez contributed reporting and Kristen Noyce contributed research.
