Mitzi McCall (born Mitzi Joan Steiner; September 9, 1924 – August 8, 2024) was an American comedian and actress. She was known for her work with her husband, Charlie Brill, and their performance on The Ed Sullivan Show on February 9, 1964, the same episode that featured the first appearance of The Beatles on the show.
In the early 1950s, McCall was married to Jack Tolen, a television director and production manager.[4] She and Charlie Brill met in 1959 and married the following year.[5] They had a daughter.[6]
Early career
Steiner had the Kiddie Castle program in Pittsburgh.[4] She received national attention in 1952 via an Associated Press story about a five-year-old Pittsburgh girl with a cleft palate who spoke her first words while watching the actress in a pantomime on television. Afterward, doctors "didn't know what to say. They held a special meeting, examined Claire, and told the happy parents that she was cured."[7]
In 1953, she was featured on Studio 10, a program on KFSD-TV in San Diego, California.[8] She performed in productions at The Pittsburgh Playhouse before heading to Hollywood.[9] Around 1955, she adopted the surname McCall to use professionally, inspired by McCall's magazine.[1]
McCall and Charlie Brill appeared on The Ed Sullivan Show on February 9, 1964, the episode that featured the U.S. television debut of The Beatles. As the last act to go on before the Beatles' second set, they performed a hastily truncated version of their full act before a studio audience of impatient Beatles fans who showed little interest in their comedy; Brill said that he and McCall "laid the biggest egg of all time".[1] Their act can be seen on the DVD of the Beatles' appearances on the Sullivan show. They were interviewed in 2005 for the "Big Break" episode of Public Radio International radio program This American Life, regarding their Beatles-Sullivan experience, including a dressing room encounter with John Lennon, who they did not recognize.[11] The poor reception to their appearance derailed their career for the next six months.[1]
In 1967, McCall and Brill had a comedy recording, From Our Point of View, released by ABC Records.[12] Later that year, the duo signed with Congressional Records.[13] They continued to perform until the 1980s.[1]
Shawlee and McCall
In the early 1960s, McCall (just over 5 feet) and actress Joan Shawlee (5'9") formed a night club act,[14] first appearing together at the Club Robaire in Cleveland.[15] In January 1961, syndicated newspaper columnist Dorothy Kilgallen reported that the team was "causing quite a stir", emphasizing while exaggerating the partners' discrepancy in height, "Joan being six feet, three inches tall and Mitzi four feet, 10 inches short".[16] In 2009, McCall had a supporting role as Bonnie in the film World's Greatest Dad.
^ abcdefgTerrace, Vincent (2011). Encyclopedia of Television Shows, 1925 through 2010 (2nd ed.). Jefferson, N.C.: McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers. p. 33. ISBN978-0-7864-6477-7.
