Community Chat

[Oznell]

The recent airing of a Perry Mason episode, "The Case of the Capering Camera",  about two glamorous sisters tangled up in blackmail, stirred my vague perception of Karyn Kupcinet.  She played the younger sister in that episode.

Skip the next two paragraphs if you're not interested in the back story of her famous father-- but I did feel I had to give some context to this!

At one time, Karyn's father,  Irv Kupcinet, "Kup" was widely known, a household name in Chicago-- he was a high-profile TV talk show host, columnist for the Chicago Sun Times, and radio personality.  He knew everybody.  My Boomer husband, who is a Chicagoan by birth, knew of him even though, growing up, he was oblivious to a lot of pop culture stuff!

Here's Kupcinet with Lauren Bacall:

I was not from Chicago, but even I had heard of him-- if you read a lot of the journalism and memoirs of the Sixties, like Norman Mailer, etc.,  "Kup" is a cultural touchstone in a lot of that writing.

Anyway, it's a long, complex story, but I'll try to keep it "pithy"--   Karyn went out to Hollywood, a young beauty, and started to get parts.  She became involved, on and off, with rising young actor Andrew Prine.  She socialized, she worried about her weight.  She and Prine started to get anonymous, sinister and threatening letters, composed of cut out newspaper letters to avoid detection of the author.

Karyn and Andrew Prine:

One night, almost a week after the Kennedy assassination, she had dinner with friends actor Mark Goddard ( of future "Lost in Space" fame) and his wife.  Accounts indicate that both noticed that she seemed "off" and were concerned. 

Karyn went home, promising to call soon.  When she didn't, the Goddards eventually went to her apartment, and found her dead, the TV on low.  Initially thought a suicide, her death after autopsy was ruled a murder by strangulation, as her hyoid bone was broken.

Noted crime writer James Ellroy, however, has theorized that she was not murdered; that she died in a freak fall while dancing...

Further complicating the narrative, writer Penn Jones Jr. maintained (without evidence, that I could see), that Karyn Kupcinet was the elusive woman, famous for making a long distance telephone call in the so. California area, warning that President Kennedy was going to be killed, shortly before he was.  His theory was that she had subsequently been murdered by organized crime to ensure that nothing came out about that supposed foreknowledge.

This rumor of her foreknowledge of that horrific event persisted as late as the early Nineties, when the "Today" show made mention of it.  This drew the ire of Irv Kupcinet, who denounced the item and reasserted that his daughter had known nothing of the event.

There is so much to this fascinating case.  To get the bare bones, the Chicago Tribune's piece,  "1963 Karyn Kupcinet Death Still Unsolved" is a start.   And even Wiki has a surprisingly long account, that includes different theories and her filmography.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karyn_Kupcinet

Other interesting facts:

Those threatening letters that she and Prine had received, were ultimately determined to have been sent by her, to try to keep Prine's waning interest.

After leaving the Goddards on the fateful night, she went home and watched TV until the wee hours with a writer and  another actor friend, the last people to see her alive, apart from the murderer, presumably.  Those two men and Andrew Prine were interviewed extensively in the aftermath.

The "Perry Mason" episode I saw with her in it, originally aired two months after her untimely death.  She was quite good, in what was an excellent episode.  She played the younger sister with a sort of furtive edge, which was appropriate given the plot twist she was hiding...

What a lovely young woman and heartbreaking case.

Edited to correct my error-- it was two other men, a writer and another actor, not three, who were at Karyn Kupcinet's apartment the night she died.

[VaBelle35]

Funny you should mention this, there is a cold case thread on Websleuthers about this.  It's old, from 2004, but was interesting to read.

I won't post a link because of ads on that site, but if you search websleuth and her name it's the first item that comes up.

[Mmsfoxxie]

I remember the Irv Kupinet Show, the Lively Art of Conversation. Yes, he was a household name.  He was called Kup as a nickname.  I remember the daughter being killed but none of the details because I was a youngster and didn't care much about the news.

I'd love to see that Perry Mason episode.  I probably have seen it but didn't realize KUP's daughter was in it.

[SharkE]

Sounds like she got mixed up with the wrong crowd. Kind of looks like Liz T.

[Pearlee]

@Oznell I remember Irv Kupcinet quite well, although I am not from Chicago. I never knew anything about this daughter story!

She sounds like a rather unstable woman from what you wrote.

[Annabellethecat66]

@Oznell  Thanks for posting that.  

I actually remember Andrew Prine.  Isn't it crazy the things we remember?

Sometimes I can't remember yesterday but something as insignificant as this guy and his name, etc. and it's all so clear to me.

[ROMARY]

Sometimes it's just better to keep silent, keep safe.  (As Jean Lake says.)     

Underline 'Sometimes'.   Not always, of course.  Just sometimes.   Look out for ourselves. 

[Oznell]

I thought she looked a bit like Elizabeth Taylor too, @SharkE .

There are so many interesting and rather haunting angles to this case.  It's a little bit reminiscent of the death of Marilyn Monroe, and also, reminds me of the Hollywood murder of young actress Dominique Dunne, the daughter of writer Dominick Dunne.  Of course, in that one, it seemed more clear cut from the beginning who had done it, so not as mysterious.

@Pearlee,  as soon as I read that she was involved with Andrew Prine my ears pricked up.  (For those who don't follow "The Fugitive" threads, we've had many a discussion about Andrew Prine playing the petulant younger brother of "Dr. Richard Kimble" in that series.)

Apparently, for years after the murder, Andrew Prine would be periodically questioned by the police.  For that matter, I think the other two men who visited her that night were as well.  I misspoke in my OP--  I believe it was just two men, a writer and another actor, who were with her at her house before she died.  You have to wonder if the continued police interest and the attendant suspicion had an effect on Prine's career... 

[DottieBlue]

@Oznell 

Very interesting story,  I had never heard of this case before.  I wish a Cold Case Squad would take it up.  I wonder what the crime scene was like--how was her body found, etc., did she have bruising on her body, any other injuries.  Perhaps it was accidental after "rough play"?

Sad story.

[SharkE]

@Oznell   We all know who was responsible for MM death. No doubt in my mind on that one. She should had skipped that whole family and kept within her Hollywood producers, actors, sports heroes, writers.