Joy Harmon dead at 87: Glamorous blonde from Cool Hand Luke car wash scene passes away after health battle
1960s screen icon Joy Harmon, who wowed fans in Cool Hand Luke, has died aged 87.
Harmon, known for her sultry turn as car-washer Lucille in the 1967 classic with Paul Newman, passed away at her Los Angeles-area home on Tuesday, surrounded by her loved ones, a family member confirmed to TMZ.
The actress, who later pivoted to running a successful bakery in Burbank, California, had been sick with pneumonia for several weeks before her death.
Harmon was said to have ‘fought until the end’ and was expected to recover before her death, and was even working at her Aunt Joy’s Bakery the day before she was taken into hospital.
Her family member told the publication she spent ‘one to two weeks in the hospital, followed by a several-week stint at a rehabilitation center, and then returned home to spend her final days on hospice care and with her loved ones.’
1960s screen icon Joy Harmon, who wowed fans in Cool Hand Luke, has died aged 87 – pictured as car-washer Lucille in the film in 1967
Harmon passed away at her Los Angeles-area home on Tuesday, surrounded by her loved ones, a family member confirmed to TMZ – pictured 1972 in The Odd Couple
She also appeared in films including Village of the Giants, Angel in my Pocket, and One Way Wahine as well as TV roles on Bewitched, The Odd Couple and Batman.
Harmon moved away from her Hollywood career to focus on raising her three children with her ex-husband Jeff Gourson.
Her family remembered Harmon as a ‘positive thinker full of life and vibrancy, and certainly had no problem spreading joy throughout her life.’
She is survived by her three children and nine grandchildren.
Born Patricia Joy Harmon in Queens in 1940, she was a newsreel model by the age of three before her family moved to Connecticut, where she was raised.
As a teenager she made finalist in the Miss Connecticut pageant and began her stage career locally in Bridgeport, kick-starting the process that led to her Broadway debut at the age of 18 in the play Make a Million.
Groucho Marx saw her in the production in New York and brought her onto his hit quiz show You Bet Your Life, launching her in Hollywood.
When he made her the announcer on his later quiz show Tell It To Groucho, he often flirted with her on set, she recalled fondly on the podcast Vanguard of Hollywood.
‘He had the reputation of being flirty with women. He was very flirty with me when we were on set. But that wasn’t like him at all, because then he would be questioning me: “Where did you go last night? What were you doing? No, you don’t do that.” He was just like a dad to me, but I loved him very much and I went a lot to his house,’ she said.
In the 1960s she jobbed around on such beloved TV series of the time as The Beverly Hillbillies, The Man from U.N.C.L.E., That Girl and Burke’s Law.
However her best-remembered role was as a blonde called Lucille in Cool Hand Luke, who suggestively washes a car and prances around for the benefit of an increasingly overheated group of inmates doing prison labor nearby.
The three-minute scene at once made her an enduring pinup of the 1960s, heralding the increasingly open sexuality of the emerging New Hollywood.
When Harmon showed up to audition for the part, the movie’s leading man Paul Newman was taken with her looks, marveling: ‘Gosh, you have the bluest eyes.’
Before the filming of the car wash scene, the male cast playing the inmates – including Newman, George Kennedy, JD Cannon, Strother Martin and and Jo Van Vleet – were forbidden from bringing their wives or girlfriends to the set.
‘They wanted the guys not to be around women for a long time,’ Harmon explained. ‘So they couldn’t talk to me – the cast, you know. They just kept them separate, ’cause they wanted their reaction I guess.’
To the last years of her life, Harmon kept getting fan mail for the car wash scene, with customers at her bakery asking her to sign stills from the film.
She married film editor and TV producer Jeff Gourson in 1968 and continued appearing on such programs as The Monkees and Love, American Style.
After a final guest shot on an episode of the 1973 flop sitcom Thicker Than Water starring Julie Harris, she retired from acting to focus on raising her children, and found her second act with her beloved Aunt Joy’s Bakery in Burbank.
