Australian television and stage entertainer, perennially outrageous, who epitomized camp, known for her screeching whiny voice and trademark line, “helloooOOO dahhhlings!!”
Little made her television debut on the Mike Walsh Show in September 1974, eight and a half months pregnant in gaudy clothes and with a distinctive off-beat sense of humour. Mistaken for a drag queen, the normally gaunt Little was an instant success and soon became a regular performer on the show, her big voice and crazy antics wowing audiences so much that she received three Logie television awards in two years including the Gold in 1976. She spent 15 years on this highly-rated daytime show. In the UK, her appearance on the BBC’s Michael Parkinson Show so startled London critics she had the London Evening News saying: “What a woman! With her in the house you wouldn’t want a TV.” Among overseas guests she has appeared with Phyllis Diller, George Burns and Danny LaRue. Little performed in Sydney in 1988 at the Royal Command Bicentennial Concert before the Prince and Princess of Wales.
Her stage career took off with Jerry’s Girls in 1991 when American director, John Frost, teamed Little with Marcia Hines, Debra Byrne and Judi Connelli. Then came Legends with Kerrie Biddell, Toni Lamond and Nancye Hayes at the Sydney Opera House. Her autobiographical one-woman cabaret shows include, Hello Daahling (1992) and Marlene: A Tribute to Dietrich (1995) which toured Australia and the USA to critical acclaim. More of a Little followed in 1998, and then A Tribute to Marilyn Monroe. In her live recording CD, Jeanne Little – At The School of Arts Cafe she talks about her life as a television star and musical theatre performer and sings favourite tunes from her shows. In the late 1990s, through to the mid-2000s, Little appeared as a panellist on television’s Beauty & the Beast.
She empathized with her many gay fans by saying that she knew how it felt to be an outcast because she was a stutterer at school. Married to interior decorator, Barrie Little, she had a daughter, Katie, who ran her own graphic arts studio.
In February 2011, it was announced Little was suffering from Alzheimer’s disease, which was initially diagnosed in 2009. She died in Sydney on 7 November 2020 at the age of 82.
Link to Wikipedia biography