Joan Shawlee
1929-1987

Irma La Douce

Director: Billy Wilder
1963

Although we haven't seen all of Joan Shawlee's film & TV performances, we sorta assume this, uh, healthy gal was fairly "Amazonian" in just about everything she ever did. She certainly "stood out" in Billy Wilder's raunchy Irma La Douce, where she was actually cast as "Amazon Annie," and she was also memorable in at least a couple of Wilder's other films -- 1958's Some Like It Hot and 1960's The Apartment. Her list of credits also includes such screen gems as House of Horrors (1946), Prehistoric Women (1950), Guerillas in Pink Lace (1964) and about four dozen others that we intend to get around to one of these days. Meanwhile, if the old Dick Van Dyke Show is showing on TV in your area, you can catch Miss Shawlee in a few episodes where she was cast as "Pickles" the positively "Amazonian" wife of the character played by Morey Amsterdam. Like many of the performers we celebrate in these pages, Joan Shawlee contributed a unique personality to the field of entertainment -- and we truly miss her.