
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: TUESDAY, July 10, 1990                   TAG: 9007100259
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: B2   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Los Angeles Times
DATELINE: HOLLYWOOD                                LENGTH: Medium

HOWARD DUFF, ACTOR, DIES OF HEART ATTACK

Howard Duff - whose resonant, cynical growl was the radio voice of detective Sam Spade and whose virile, well-traveled features became known later to two generations of filmgoers and TV viewers - died Monday.

Duff, recently on television as Sheriff Titus Semple on "Flamingo Road" and Sen. Henry Harrison O'Dell on "Dallas," was stricken late Sunday at his Santa Barbara, Calif., home. He was taken to St. Francis Hospital and pronounced dead there. He was believed to be 76.

His wife of 17 years, Judy, said that he had suffered a heart attack Sunday night.

He died a day after taking part in a local telethon to raise money for victims of last month's Santa Barbara fire, which left hundreds homeless.

With former wife Ida Lupino, Duff became a favorite on the Hollywood scene, appearing opposite her in a short-lived TV situation comedy series in 1956-57 entitled "Mr. Adams and Eve." It was a classic case of life imitating art as he portrayed half of a husband-and-wife film-star team battling with studios, agents and themselves.

His nearly two-dozen movies included "Kramer vs. Kramer," "The Naked City," "The Late Show," "While the City Sleeps" and "A Wedding."

And he was a frequent guest on such TV shows as "The Golden Girls," "Midnight Caller" and "Knot's Landing."

But none ever seemed to recapture the Duff mystique as did Sam Spade, first heard over the nation's airwaves in 1946.

The radio show, sponsored by Wildroot Cream Oil and adapted from Dashiell Hammett's 1930 crime classic "The Maltese Falcon," showcased Duff as Spade, a mildly alcoholic, mostly down-and-out private detective whose first question of prospective clients was "How much money you got on you?"

With that as a down payment, Spade hopped aboard streetcars (he was too cheap to ride cabs), sampling several bourbon bottles and picking his way through seamy San Francisco neighborhoods as he sought an assortment of scoundrels and faithless wives.

Waiting patiently back at his office was his babbling secretary, Effie Perrine, who would answer his phone calls and take his rambling dictation.

Duff was Spade until 1950, when he left to pursue a film career.

After leaving the show Duff married Lupino. That was in 1951, four years after making his motion picture debut in "Brute Force."

They divorced in the early 1970s after having a daughter, Bridget, who was born in 1952. With his wife, she survives him as does a brother, Doug.

by CNB