Born Estelle Caro Eggleston on October 1, 1938,[3][4] in Yazoo City, Mississippi,[5] she was the only child of Thomas Ellett Eggleston, an insurance salesman, and his wife, Estelle (née Caro) Eggleston, a nurse who was sometimes called by the nickname "Dovey".[3][6][7] One of the younger Estelle Eggleston's great-grandfathers was Henry Clay Tyler, an early settler from Boston and a jeweler who gave the Yazoo City courthouse cupola its clock.[3]
When Stella Stevens was four, her parents moved to Memphis, Tennessee; they lived on Carrington Road, near Highland Street, in the city.[6] She attended St. Anne's Catholic School which is on Highland Street and Sacred Heart School on Jefferson Avenue graduating from high school in 1955 at the Memphis Evening School at Memphis Technical High School.[6][8]
At age 16, she married electrician Noble Herman Stephens, on December 3, 1954, in Holly Springs, Mississippi. They moved to Memphis, where their only child, Herman Andrew Stephens (later Andrew Stevens) was born on June 10, 1955. The couple divorced in 1957.
While studying at Memphis State University, Stella became interested in acting and modeling. According to her official biography, "Her schooling in Memphis included a couple of years at Memphis State University, where she was noticed in the school play Bus Stop. The Memphis Press-Scimitar review of that performance in Memphis sparked her career."[9]
Stevens was modelling and working for Goldsmith's department store in Memphis when she signed a contract with 20th Century-Fox in 1958 with Buddy Adler and Dick Powell considering her for a film based on the life of Jean Harlow.[10] She made her film debut in Say One for Me (1959), a modest musical produced by and starring Bing Crosby, appearing in the minor role of a chorus girl.[11] Stevens' contract with Fox was dropped after six months.[12] After winning the role of Appassionata Von Climax in the musical Li'l Abner (1959), she signed a contract with Paramount Pictures (1959-1963).[12] In 1960, she won the Golden Globe Award for New Star of the Year – Actress for her performance in Say One for Me, sharing the distinction with fellow up-and-comers Tuesday Weld, Angie Dickinson, and Janet Munro.[1]
In 1963 she appeared in two successful comedy films: The Nutty Professor starring comedian Jerry Lewis, where she plays his student and love interest Stella Purdy, and in Vincente Minnelli's The Courtship of Eddie's Father, playing the would-be "Miss Montana" beauty queen.
In 1964, she signed a four-year contract with Columbia Pictures.[12] Following appearances in Synanon (1965) and The Secret of My Success (1965), Stevens starred as a sexy but clumsy government agent opposite Dean Martin in the Matt Helm spy spoof The Silencers (1966). Her last film for Columbia was Where Angels Go,Trouble Follows (1968) in which she played a young nun, Sister George, "who understands and sympathizes with the rebellious students" at a girls' Catholic boarding school. [13]
Although she continued to appear in feature films for the next four decades, Stevens shifted the focus of her career to television series, miniseries, and telemovies.
Television career
Stella Stevens and Hugh O'Brian, General Electric Theater, 1961
Stevens appeared in several top television series in the 1960s, including Alfred Hitchcock Presents (1960), General Electric Theater (1960, 1961), and Ben Casey (1964). One of her earliest television appearances was in a critically acclaimed 1960 episode of Bonanza, "Silent Thunder"; she played a deaf-mute.
During the 1980s, she continued to work regularly on series including Newhart (1983), The Love Boat (1983), Fantasy Island (1983), Highway to Heaven (1984), Night Court (1984), Murder, She Wrote (1985), Magnum, P.I. (1986), and Father Dowling Mysteries (1987). Stevens appears in 34 episodes of the primetime soap opera Flamingo Road (1981–82), as Lute-Mae Sanders, the former madam of a brothel.[16] During a 1988 interview she commented on her role as a madam in Flamingo Road, saying that, "The truth of the matter is that I've always been type cast, but I don't mind because hookers are among the few roles that require glamorous wardrobes, feathers and jewelry."[17]
In January 1960, she was Playboy magazine's Playmate of the Month and was also featured in Playboy pictorials in 1965 and 1968.[17] She was included in Playboy's 100 Sexiest Stars of the 20th Century, appearing at number 27. During the 1960s, she was one of the most photographed women in the world.[3]
In 1974, she sued Playboy and Hugh Hefner for $7 million, claiming that they had published pictures of her for 15 years without her consent, some of which depicted her "in a highly degrading and humiliating manner" and that she had lost numerous film roles due to the image portrayed of her by Playboy.[18]
Speaking about her Playboy features, Stevens told The New York Times, "If you've got ten million people seeing you in a layout like that ... and half of them remember the name 'Stella Stevens', they'll buy tickets for your movies."[17]
Stevens appeared in several stage productions, including a touring production of an all-female version of Neil Simon's The Odd Couple opposite Sandy Dennis. Stevens played the Oscar Madison character. She directed feature film The Ranch (1989) and produced and directed The American Heroine (1979). In 1999, she co-wrote a novel, Razzle Dazzle, about a Memphis-born singer named Johnny Gault.[2]
Stevens in 2009
Personal life
Stevens was married to Noble Herman Stephens from 1954, when she was 16, until their divorce in 1957. Their son Andrew was born in 1955.[19] Following her divorce she changed the spelling of her last name to 'Stevens' and left her son in the custody of her parents while she sought out a successful acting career. In the years following, she and her former husband engaged in a custody battle for their son, with each party accusing the other of kidnapping, before Stevens finally won full custody.[17] Her son's professional name is Andrew Stevens.
In 1983, Stevens began a long-term relationship with rock guitarist Bob Kulick. A little over a year later, he moved into Stevens' Beverly Hills home.[4] In March 2016, Kulick and Stevens sold her longtime Beverly Hills home, and she moved to a long-term Alzheimer's care facility in Los Angeles. Kulick often visited her there until his death on May 28, 2020.[21]
Poster for film Girls, Girls, Girls 1962The Nutty Professor movie poster
Death
Stevens died of complications from Alzheimer's disease in Los Angeles on February 17, 2023, at the age of 84.[22][17][23]
^Some sources cite her birthplace as Hot Coffee, Mississippi. Stevens confirms Yazoo City in Macklin, Tony (July 31, 2004). "The Ballad of Stella Stevens: An Interview". Bright Lights Film Journal. Archived from the original on February 17, 2023. Retrieved March 28, 2016. [I am from] Yazoo City. Hot Coffee is Meridian — it's on the way to Gulfport and Biloxi. We would stop at this place that had a sign that said 'Hot Coffee', so everybody nicknamed it 'Hot Coffee.'
^ abcLauderdale, Vance (December 2011). "Stella!". Memphis Magazine. Archived from the original on December 5, 2012. Retrieved May 5, 2012.
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