Earl Leaf/Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images(NEW YORK) — Jayne Meadows has died, her agent confirmed to ABC News. She was 95.
Meadows, who was married to TV legend Steve Allen from 1954 until his death in 2000, was born in China and moved to Connecticut with her missionary parents as a child. As a teenager, she developed a love of theater and made a name for herself in a local company as “the redhead with the loud voice,” she once told Emmy TV Legends.
Meadows went on to earn three Emmy nominations for her work on Meeting of Minds, St. Elsewhere and High Society. However, her favorite time professionally were the years she spent with her husband as a celebrity panelist on I’ve Got a Secret.
“That was a period in New York, where everybody I worked with, they were our best friends and I would do the show at night and the next day I’d be leaving the apartment…and the cab drivers [would yell], ‘Jayney! Great show last night! How’s Steve-o? How’s the baby?'” she told Emmy TV Legends. “It was the medium that came into your living room. Every living room…they knew you as a friend.”
Her work in TV was varied — from appearances on What’s My Line? and Hollywood Squares to The Honeymooners alongside her sister, Audrey Meadows. She also appeared on Broadway in Spring Again, The Gazebo, and Once In a Lifetime, and in films including Undercurrent and Lady in the Lake.
Meadows is survived by her son, Bill Allen.
“She was the most loving mother and grandmother I could ever imagine,” he told Entertainment Tonight. “Seeing only the best in all her family members and giving us all confidence that we had value to offer the world and should take risks because we could do no wrong in her eyes.”
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