Edd
Byrnes, who gained fleeting fame as
Kookie
, the ultra-hip, wisecracking parking attendant on the jazzy
1950s-’60s
ABC detective series
77 Sunset Strip
, has died. He was 87.
Byrnes, who years later played the smooth-talking Vince Fontaine, a Dick Clark-like dance contest host, in
Grease
(1978), died unexpectedly Wednesday of natural causes at his home in Santa Monica, his son, San Diego TV news anchor Logan Byrnes, said on Twitter.
“It is with profound sadness and grief that I share with you the passing of my father Edd Byrnes. He was an amazing man and one of my best friends,” he
wrote.
On
77 Sunset Strip
,
Kookie
parked cars at Dino’s Lodge, a Hollywood nightclub that was owned by Dean Martin and served as a backdrop on the show. The club was next door to the private detective agency run by the suave duo of Stuart Bailey (
Efrem
Zimbalist
Jr
.
) and Jeff Spencer (
Roger Smith
).
When he wasn’t “piling up the Z’s” (that would be sleeping), the finger-snapping Kookie was running a comb through his wavy
ducktail
, and Byrnes became one of television’s first heartthrobs, in an Elvis kind of way. He elicited shrieks of delight from young female fans everywhere and parlayed that teen-idol fame into a gold record, “
Kookie
,
Kookie
, Lend Me Your Comb.”
Recorded with actress Connie Stevens, the song (on Warner Bros. Records) made it to No. 4 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart in May 1959.
At the peak of his popularity, Byrnes received more than 15,000 fan letters a week, exceeding the record that Warner Bros., the studio behind
77 Sunset Strip
, had ever received for any star (yes, more than even Errol Flynn and James
Cagney
). The actor said he once appeared on 26 magazine covers in one week alone.
“As
Kookie
, I was one of the first young fellows on television, one of the first that the young could identify with,” he said in 1969.
His contract prohibited Byrnes from accepting plum roles in such movies as
Ocean’s Eleven
,
North to Alaska
and
Rio Bravo
, and John F. Kennedy was said to have objected to having someone known as
Kookie
play him in the 1963 film
PT 109
. The role went to Cliff Robertson.
At one point, Byrnes walked off the show and retreated into a heavy drinking period. He returned in an “upgraded” role in May 1960, with
Kookie
now a partner in the agency and sporting a coat and tie.
After
77 Sunset Strip
ended its six-season-run in 1963, Byrnes moved to Europe to star in a string of spaghetti Westerns and spy thrillers. He sporadically returned to Hollywood to capitalize on his Kookie notoriety.
In 1975,
Merv
Griffin signed Byrnes to host a new game show, and two half-hour pilots were filmed. NBC liked it but insisted on another host, and so Chuck Woolery got the gig on
Wheel of Fortune
.
Edward Byrne Breitenberger was born in New York City. After his alcoholic father died when Byrnes was 13, he took the surname of his maternal grandfather, a New York City fireman. He developed an interest in performing and after high school landed summer-stock work. At age 22, he set out for Los Angeles, arriving in September 1955, one day after James Dean died in a car crash.
Byrnes landed a number of minor parts, then was cast as a killer who compulsively combed his hair in
Girl on the Run
(1958), which effectively served as the pilot for
77 Sunset Strip
. The actor was such a hit, producers decided to keep him around as another character, Gerald Lloyd
Kookson
III. His
pre-Fonzie
, cool-guy persona soon caught on like wildfire.
He also appeared in such films as
Reform School Girl
(1957),
Darby’s Rangers
(1958),
Marjorie Morningstar
(1958),
Life Begins at 17
(1958),
Up Periscope
(1959),
Yellowstone Kelly
(1959),
Beach Ball
(1965), Michael
Apted’s
Stardust
(1974) and
Troop Beverly Hills
(1989) and on TV shows including
Cheyenne
,
Maverick
,
Honey West
,
Mannix
,
Police Woman
,
Charlie’s Angels
,
Fantasy Island
and
Murder, She Wrote
.
Byrnes was married from 1962-71 to actress
Asa
Maynor
(she played the stewardess in the famous
Twilight Zone
episode “Nightmare at 20,000 Feet,” starring William
Shatner
). In addition to his son, survivors include his longtime partner, Cathrine.
In his 1996 autobiography,
Kookie
No More
, he detailed his addiction to drugs and alcohol.