Claudine Longet, the French-born singer, actress and ex-wife of Andy Williams who was at the center of a scandalous 1976 trial and media circus after she fatally shot her boyfriend, Olympic skier Spider Sabich, has died. She was 84.
Her death was reported Thursday by her nephew Bryan Longet. No details of her death were immediately available.
The enchanting, doe-eyed Longet recorded albums of breathy pop for A&M Records before she sang the Henry Mancini-Don Black song “Nothing to Lose” in Blake Edwards’ The Party (1968), in which she portrayed an aspiring actress alongside Peter Sellers.
A onetime Las Vegas showgirl, Longet had married “Moon River” crooner Williams in December 1961 and appeared on his long-running NBC variety show and Christmas specials, often with their three children.
After she and Williams divorced in 1975, Longet and the kids were living with the California-born Sabich at his chalet in Starwood, Colorado, when she shot him on March 21, 1976, in his bathroom with a .22-caliber German‐made gun that had been purchased by his father. She claimed the gun accidentally discharged as he was showing her how it worked.
