Connie Stevens has had a long and lucrative career in the movie, television, and recording industry. Her first big break came when Jerry Lewis cast her in Rock-a-Bye Baby in 1958, and blossomed from there into three big TV roles in Hawaiian Eye, Maverick, and Wendy and Me (with George Burns). Her attention turned to music in the early 1960’s and she scored big hits with the songs Kookie, Kookie, Lend Me Your Comb with 77 Sunset Strip star Edd Byrnes, and with her solo hit Sixteen Reasons.
I’m ashamed to say that most of my knowledge of Connie Stevens comes from the line in American Graffiti when Toad (Charles Martin Smith) yells out his car window to Debbie (Candy Clark) “Hey, did anybody ever tell you that you look just like Connie Stevens?” Then I got my exposure to the real Connie Stevens when she starred in Grease 2 as Miss Mason (a role originally intended for Annette Funicello).
I got even more exposure to Connie Stevens when I met her in person at the Hollywood Show in Burbank on Saturday, April 2, 2011. My friend Bob and I worked out a great joint deal with her whereby we both got signed photos and pictures with her for $20 – which saved us ten bucks each. It was a great deal and it was quite cool to meet her. And like her American Graffiti counterpart, she truly did look like Connie Stevens.
Celebrities of the Spring 2011 Hollywood Show will continue…
To be fair, her role in “Maverick” was as a guest star in a single episode.
Peter
November 2nd, 2011