[Deathwatch] Fay Wray, 'King Kong' actress, 96

[Deathwatch Central <cdw@slick.org>]

'King Kong' actress Fay Wray dead
Monday, August 9, 2004 Posted: 3:20 PM EDT (1920 GMT) 

http://www.cnn.com/2004/SHOWBIZ/Movies/08/09/obit.wray.ap/index.html

NEW YORK (AP) -- Fay Wray, who won everlasting fame as the damsel held
atop the Empire State Building by the giant ape in the 1933 film
classic "King Kong," has died, a close friend said Monday. She was 96.

Wray died Sunday at her Manhattan apartment, said Rick McKay, a friend
and director of the last film she appeared in.

During a career that started in 1923, Wray appeared with such stars as
Ronald Colman, Gary Cooper and Spencer Tracy, but she was destined to
be linked with the rampaging Kong in movie fans' minds.

"I used to resent 'King Kong,' " she remarked in a 1963 interview. "But
now I don't fight it anymore. I realize that it is a classic, and I am
pleased to be associated with it. Why, only recently an entire issue of
a French magazine was devoted to discussing the picture from its
artistic, moral and even religious aspects."

She wrote in her 1988 autobiography, "On the Other Hand": "Each time I
arrive in New York and see the skyline and the exquisite beauty of the
Empire State Building, my heart beats a little faster. I like that
feeling. I really like it!"

"King Kong" obscured the other notable films Wray made during the '30s.
They included adventures "The Four Feathers" (with Richard Arlen and
William Powell) and "Viva Villa" (Wallace Beery), Westerns "The Texan"
(Cooper) and "The Conquering Horde" (Arlen), romances "One Sunday
Afternoon" (Cooper) and "The Unholy Garden" (Colman) as well as horror
films "Dr. X" and "The Mystery of the Wax Museum."