From Newsgroup: alt.obituaries
https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/tv/tv-news/jaye-p-morgan-dead-gong-show- singer-1236681831/
Jaye P. Morgan, Singer and Bawdy rCyGong ShowrCO Panelist, Dies at 94
A lover of double entendres, she got fired from the Chuck Barris game show after showing her breasts during a Gene Gene Dancing Machine routine.
By Mike Barnes
August 26, 2026 6:03am
Jaye P. Morgan, the husky-voiced, hit-making singer of the 1950s whose bad behavior on The Gong Show made her a fan favorite before she went a bit
too far, has died. She was 94.
Morgan lived in Castle Rock, Washington, and died Monday, her family announced.
In 1955, she found success with rCLThatrCOs All I Want From YourCY (it made it to No. 3 on the Billboard Hot 100), rCLThe Longest WalkrCY (No. 6), rCLDanger! Heartbreak Ahead,rCY rCLIf You DonrCOt Want My LoverCY and rCLPepper-Hot Baby.rCY
She also served as a vocalist on the ABC quiz show Stop the Music in
1954-55; toplined her own twice-weekly NBC variety program in 1956 in
which she performed with brothers Duke, Bob, Charlie and Dick; and was a regular on Robert Q. LewisrCO CBS daytime show.
Morgan appeared often on The Tonight Show rCo she said she was Johnny CarsonrCys guest about 150 times in New York and L.A. rCo and it was on the late-night show that she honed her naughty reputation.
rCLJohnny is very raunchy,rCY she told The New York Times in 1981. rCLWe used to
send each other the filthiest telegrams and get them delivered because we
cast them in unusual words. It was fun to put anything over on any
network. You have to make them worry constantly.rCY
In one notable segment, she ripped the host for giving his cigarette more attention than she was getting.
Morgan also made an impression on The Gong Show, the zany NBC game show
hosted and created by Chuck Barris that aired on NBC and in syndication in daytime and primetime from 1976-80. The program gave amateurs a chance to display their so-called talent in front of three celebrity judges.
One act featured two young women sitting on the stage and licking orange Popsicles (yes, that was the whole act). Phyllis Diller gave them a zero
and Jamie Farr gave them a 2, but Morgan gave them the highest score
possible, a 10. rCLDonrCOt you know thatrCOs the way I started?rCY she said with a
smile.
Morgan, who was very fond of double entendres, was eventually fired from
The Gong Show after she took off her jacket and tie, unbuttoned her blouse
and bared her breasts during a Gene Gene Dancing Machine routine. Many say
the show was never the same after she was banished.
She was born Mary Margaret Morgan on Dec. 3, 1931, in a log cabin in
Mancos, Colorado. At age 3, she took to the road in a vaudeville act with
her father, mother, five brothers and a sister, and The Morgan Family
appeared in the 1935 Pat OrCOBrien movie musical Stars Over Broadway.
They all moved to California, and while serving as class treasurer as a
junior at Verdugo Hills High School outside Los Angeles, she was nicknamed rCLJaye P.rCY after the banker J.P. (John Pierpoint) Morgan.
rCLWhen I left school at 17 and began working with [orchestra leader] Frank DeVol, he liked [the name], so it stuck,rCY she said in a 1992 interview
with the Los Angeles Times. They recorded her first hit, a version of
rCLLife Is Just a Bowl of Cherries,rCY in 1951.
After marrying pianist-composer Artie Kane and leaving show business, she returned in the 1960s as an actress and appeared on General Electric
Theater; The Danny Thomas Show; My Three Sons; Love, American Style; The
Odd Couple; and The Muppet Show and in the movies Coming Attractions
(1978), Night Patrol (1984) and Home Alone 2: Lost in New York (1992).
She sang the theme songs to John Goldfarb, Please Come Home (1965),
starring Shirley MacLaine, and the 1975 NBC sitcom Fay, starring Lee
Grant. She also recorded a 1976 pop-R&B album produced by a young David
Foster and performed in nightclubs.
Her association with Barris continued with appearances on the game shows
The Chuck Barris Rah Rah Show and The $1.98 Beauty Show, in The Gong Show Movie (1980) and in the biopic Confessions of a Dangerous Mind (2002), directed by George Clooney.
Survivors include her son, Paul.
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