SHARI LEWIS

with Lamb Chop & Hush Puppy

 

SHARI LEWIS   1933-1998

BORN: January 17, 1933

FAME: Star of Children's Television Shows

CHARACTERS: Lamb Chop, Charlie Horse, and Hush Puppy

LINK: www.grandtimes.com/lambchop.html   1997 interview

LINK: www.tvacres.com/child_sharilewis.htm

LINK: www.imdb.com/name/nm0507741/

LINK: www.tv.com/shari-lewis/person/1068/summary.html

LINK: www.tvparty.com/lostny2captv.html

LINK: www.talkingcomedy.com/SI-Vent-2005/tv-siVENT05/SL-TV-siVENT05.html

1953: Facts 'n' Fun with Shari Lewis (local NY television show)

1954: Kartoon Klub (television show)

1955: Captain Kangaroo (famous children's television show)

1956: Shariland (new name for NY TV show)

1957: Hi Mom! (local NY TV show)

1960: The Shari Lewis Show (NBC television)

1968: The Banana Splits Adventure Hour  TV Series

1968: The Arabian Knights  TV Series (voice)

1973: A Picture of Us  (TV) .... Host

1975: The Shari Show TV Series

1992: Lamb Chop's Play-Along  TV Series

1994: Lamb Chop and the Haunted Studio (TV)

1995: Lamb Chop's Special Chanukah (TV)

1996: Shari's Passover Surprise  (TV)

1998: The Charlie Horse Music Pizza  TV Series

 

          TRIVIA

Co-wrote "The Lights of Zetar" episode of "Star Trek" (1966) with her husband Jeremy Tarcher and hoped to be cast as the female guest star. The part went to Jan Shutan.

When asked by TV Guide to supply an item for a celebrity recipes issue, submitted a recipe for lamb chops.

Was an accomplished symphony conductor.

Biography in "American National Biography". Supplement 1, pp. 359-360. New York: Oxford University Press, 2002.

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from www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/biography/Lewis_Shari.html

Shari Lewis

(1934-1998)

Shari Lewis was born Phyllis Hurwitz to Ann and Abraham Hurwitz on January 17, 1934, in New York City. Her father was a founding member of Yeshiva University in New York City.

Through the encouragement of both of her parents, Shari began performing at the age of thirteen when her father taught her magic acts with Jewish content. As a youth, she had lessons in acrobatics, juggling, piano, violin and ventriloquism. She studied piano and violin at New York's High School of Music and Art, dance at the American School of Ballet, and acting with Sanford Meisner of the Neighborhood Playhouse. She attended Columbia University for one year, then left college to become a performer.

In 1952, Lewis and her puppetry won first prize on Arthur Godfrey's Talent Scouts television show. In March 1956, she and Lamb Chop appeared on Captain Kangaroo and by 1960 she had her own television program.

After twenty-seven years' absence from American television, the Public Broadcasting System approached her about reviving her television show. Lamp Chop's Play-Along, seen on PBS stations and reproduced in video, grew out of PBS interest and Lewis's discontent with commercial television.

The video Lamp Chop's Special Chanukah was released in 1996 and received the Parent's Choice award of the year.

Among her awards are twelve Emmy Awards, the Dor L'Dor award of the B'nai B'rith (1996), three Houston Film Festival awards, the Peabody Award (1960), the Silver Circle Award of the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences (1996), the Film Advisory Board Award of Excellence (1996), two Charleston Film Festival Gold Awards (1995), the Houston World Festival silver and bronze awards (1995), the New York Film and Video Festival Silver Award (1995), the Monte Carlo Prize for the World's Best Television Variety Show (1963), and the Kennedy Center annual award for excellence (1983).

Shari Lewis died in 1998 of pneumonia while being treated at Cedars-Sinai Hospital at the age of 65.

 

Lamb Chop Puppets

available at www.puppetville.com/lambchop-puppet/

   

Lamb Chop - A shy, soft-spoken, fleecy little lamb sock puppet with a voice of a child and a penchant for wisecracks featured on THE SHARI LEWIS SHOW/NBC/1960-63. Lamb Chop was born according to Shari Lewis, when her father said "If Mary had a little lamb, why not Shari?" In 1957, Shari Lewis first appeared with Lamb Chop on CAPTAIN KANGAROO, as the niece of Mr. Greenjeans. Lamb Chop was once described as a "6-year-old girl, very intuitive and very feisty, a combination of obstinacy and vulnerability....you know how they say fools rush in where wise men fear to go? Well, Lamb Chop would rush in, then scream for help." In the 1980s Shari Lewis created a video featuring Lamb Chop called "Have I got a Story For You" about the art of teaching and telling stories. The character Lamb Chop has been immortalized in the shape of a huge balloon that first floated over Santa Ana, California, in the 2nd annual "Toys on Parade" which boasts the only giant balloon parade west of the Rockies. The 65-foot balloon took over two years to build. Constructed of rubber-coated nylon cloth, the balloon is covered with over 30 gallons of paint. Lamb Chop hands are 7-feet long and her buttons are five-feet across. In the 1990s Lamb Chop returned to TV in the motivational half-hour children's program LAMB CHOP'S PLAY ALONG/PBS/1992.

17" Lamb Chop full body puppet           Price:  $11.95