Phyllis Diller, A Legend Gone

Phyllis Diller dead at 95

By Dave Nemetz | Yahoo! TV – 1 hours 46 minutes ago

Legendary comedienne Phyllis Diller, who blazed a trail for a generation of female comics with her revealing, self-deprecating stand-up routines, has died at age 95, according to TMZ. (The Associated Press and The Hollywood Reporter have since confirmed.)

Diller had been suffering health problems as of late: She recently hurt her hip and wrist in a fall and has been living under hospice care at her Los Angeles home. She passed away there this morning, surrounded by family. Diller's longtime manager, Milton Suchin, told The Associated Press, "She died peacefully in her sleep and with a smile on her face."

The funny lady, known for her wild hair and distinctive laugh, often poked fun at her less-than-glamorous looks: She started out in 1952 filming a local TV special entitled "Phyllis Diller: The Homely Friendmaker." She rose to fame with a series of TV specials alongside Bob Hope in the 1960s and later starred in several TV shows based around her act ("The Phyllis Diller Show," "The Beautiful Phyllis Diller Show"); she also frequently appeared on the seminal '60s variety show "Laugh-In."

Diller was a mom and a housewife before she ventured into comedy, and built that domestic experience into her routines, mocking her own terrible cooking ("My cooking is so bad, my kids thought Thanksgiving was to commemorate Pearl Harbor") and her fictional husband "Fang" ("Fang can’t stand to see trash and garbage lying around the house. He can’t stand the competition"). Diller was actually married and divorced twice, but "Fang" remained a part of her act till the end.

In recent years, Diller reveled in her role as an elder statesman of comedy, outdoing much younger comedians in the 2005 documentary "The Aristocrats" and even performing a routine on "The Tonight Show" in 2007, at the tender age of 89. She also guest starred as one of William Shatner's sexual conquests (!) in a 2007 episode of "Boston Legal."

Watch a vintage Phyllis Diller performance right here: