Shelley Fabares, Johnny Angel singer and Coach actress, dies at 82

Shelley Fabares, who played the teenage daughter Mary Stone on The Donna Reed Show, topped the pop charts with Johnny Angel and later returned to television as Christine Armstrong on Coach, died Saturday, Aug. 22, in Los Angeles at 82.

Her family announced the death in a statement to The Associated Press and did not give a cause. The Hollywood Reporter said she died after a brief illness. Fabares was born Jan. 19, 1944, in Santa Monica, California, and grew up in and around Hollywood.

Few performers spanned as many chapters of American television. Fabares appeared as a teenager in the late 1950s, as a supporting player through the 1970s and as a network sitcom lead into the late 1990s. Her family said her work became part of the fabric of American television and film, spanning a career that began when she was a child.

From child actor to Mary Stone

Born Michele Ann Marie Fabares, she began acting at age 3 and made her television debut at 10, in a 1954 episode of The Loretta Young Show. Her mother started her in modeling as a young child, and her aunt was the Broadway and screen actress Nanette Fabray.

On The Donna Reed Show, she played Mary Stone, the wholesome teenage daughter of Donna Reed's homemaker character. The ABC sitcom ran for 275 episodes from 1958 to 1966. Fabares was a regular through 1963, when Mary was written off to college, and returned for guest appearances until December 1965. During the run she also co-starred on the Disney serial Annette, opposite Annette Funicello.

The role made her a household name.

Beyond the Stone family living room, she turned up over the years in Annie Oakley, The Twilight Zone, The Incredible Hulk, Fantasy Island, Mork & Mindy, The Love Boat, Newhart and Murder, She Wrote.

A number-one hit she doubted

Her fame on the show led to a recording contract, and Johnny Angel reached No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 on April 7, 1962, holding the top spot for two weeks. The single sold more than a million copies and was certified gold. It was written by Lyn Duddy and Lee Pockriss.

She followed with the Top 40 singles Johnny Loves Me, which reached No. 21, and The Things We Did Last Summer, and she released the album Shelley! In Canada, three of her songs reached the Top 40, with Johnny Angel spending three weeks at No. 1. Even so, she long insisted the success was studio-made.

I was stunned about that, to put it mildly. After all, I never could sing.

The recording career ran alongside her acting. She stepped back from The Donna Reed Show in 1963 to pursue other work, returning periodically until the series ended in 1966, and in 1963 shared the Colpix album Teenage Triangle with James Darren and Paul Petersen.

Three films with Elvis

That film work put her opposite Elvis Presley in three pictures, Girl Happy in 1965, Spinout in 1966 and Clambake in 1967. The films came near the end of her run as a teen idol, as she moved into adult roles and a steady stream of guest parts on prime-time television.

In her adult career Fabares deliberately took roles that cut against her good-girl image. On the original One Day at a Time she played Francine Webster, a scheming business rival of Bonnie Franklin's Ann Romano, recurring across six seasons from 1978 to 1984. The part let her play a villain.

One of her most-praised roles came in the 1971 television movie Brian's Song, one of the most acclaimed TV films of the decade, in which she played Joy Piccolo, wife of Chicago Bears running back Brian Piccolo, opposite James Caan. The drama followed Piccolo's fatal battle with cancer, with Billy Dee Williams as teammate Gale Sayers.

She was also a regular on The Brian Keith Show, The Practice and Forever Fernwood as she worked steadily through the 1970s.

Christine Armstrong on Coach

Fabares found her second signature television role in 1989 as Christine Armstrong, a television news anchor who was the girlfriend, and later the wife, of Hayden Fox, the blustery college football coach played by Craig T. Nelson. The ABC sitcom ran for nine seasons through 1997.

Fox coached the fictional Minnesota State Screaming Eagles for seven seasons before moving to the NFL's expansion Orlando Breakers, and Fabares appeared in 199 of the series' 200 episodes. Playing an independent professional opposite Nelson's coach, she earned two Primetime Emmy nominations for outstanding supporting actress in a comedy series, in 1993 and 1994.

After Coach ended in 1997 she worked mostly in voice roles, playing Martha Kent in Superman: The Animated Series and in Justice League, and last recording the part in 2006.

A marriage of four decades

Fabares married Mike Farrell, known for playing B.J. Hunnicutt on M*A*S*H, in 1984 at the home of her aunt, Nanette Fabray. The couple stayed married for more than 40 years, until her death. They worked together occasionally, including on the 1983 television film Memorial Day and as the voices of Martha and Jonathan Kent in Superman: The Animated Series.

Her first marriage, to the music and film producer Lou Adler, began in 1964 and ended in a divorce finalized in 1980. Through Farrell she became stepmother to his children Erin and Michael, from his earlier marriage to actress Judy Farrell, and her family called those bonds among the ones she held dearest.

Fabares faced serious health problems in her later years. In early 1999, an emergency room visit for an esophageal bleed revealed liver failure caused by autoimmune hepatitis, and she underwent transplant surgery in October 2000 after a long wait for a donor.

Three years after the surgery, she told Cedars-Sinai Medical Center she had been changed by the experience and credited Farrell, who she said was with her every step of the way. After her mother died of Alzheimer's disease in 1992, Fabares became a devoted advocate for awareness of the disease.

She always had a smile. She was welcoming in the midst of chaos and always someone I could go to for advice and counsel ... I'll remember you with love, Shelley Fabares.

Beyond acting, Fabares was a longtime member of the Screen Actors Guild who served on its national board and produced the union's awards ceremony from 2004, Variety reported. Farrell was active for years in political causes, including the anti-nuclear movement and protests against U.S. policy in Central America.

What her family said

In announcing her death, her family described her as a devoted wife, cherished stepmother and loyal friend whose warmth, generosity, humor and grace made an enduring difference in the lives of everyone who knew her. They said she had a remarkable ability to make people feel welcomed and valued, and asked that their privacy be respected.

The family said that to those closest to her, her greatest legacy was personal, measured in the love she gave and the friendships and family bonds she treasured. They said they were heartbroken by her loss, yet grateful for the years they shared, and that her work and the memories she created would live on.

Fabares was 82. She had spent five decades on American screens, from a family living room in the 1950s to a coach's household in the 1990s, before stepping back in her final years.