Fang, for the Memories

Phyllis Diller, the Title IX Rodney Dangerfield, has died at the age of 95. Giving up the glamour of being a 37-year-old homemaker for the stage, Diller delighted fans for 50 years by discussing her ineptitude at housework, her beloved husband Fang and her ridiculous appearance. Wearing hideous metal muumuus, high-heeled boots, a jeweled collar or fur scarf, a fright wig, and an elongated cigarette holder, Diller crafted her stage persona as the slightly mad self-deprecating harpy, complete with unholy cackle. Among her gems: “I once wore a peekaboo blouse. People would peek and then they’d boo;” “I never made ‘Who’s Who,’ but I’m featured in ‘What’s That?’” Just a few years after regaling fellow housewives at the laundromat with exaggerated tales of her poverty-tainted homelife, she was telling them to the nation as a frequent guest of Jack Paar’s on The Tonight Show. Although she eventually fixed her long nose, she was attractive enough to be asked to pose nude for Playboy, though the photos were rejected – she looked too good to elicit the comedic effect the magazine expected, one of the rare times she  failed to get a laugh. Her attempts at starring in TV and movies were duds, but she was a frequent guest star, playing a drunk cook on 7th Heaven, Mimi Bobek’s grandmother on The Drew Carey Show, chain-smoking, gambling Thelma Griffin, Peter’s mother on Family Guy and appeared as herself, one of Denny Crane’s past lovers, on Boston Legal.