Word: egstrom
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Miss Peggy Lee, they always called her. If the honorific was meant to elevate a plain stage name (she was born Norma Deloris Egstrom), the effort was redundant; for Lee, vocally and visually, was class and sass in one platinum package. Statue-still onstage, whispering her lyrics like postcoital pillow talk, Lee gave a guilty-secret glow to the blandest ballads. By the mid-'40s she was a pop star and a rare singer-songwriter (It's a Good Day, Manana); in 1955 she composed songs for Disney's Lady and the Tramp and 36 years later won a suit...
...been a quarter of a century since a shy blonde out of Jamestown, N. Dak., named Peggy Lee (real name: Norma Egstrom) sang that lament with Benny Goodman's band. She did right-and made plenty money. The intervening years have brought her smash-hit records (Lover, Fever), success as a songwriter (Mañana, It's a Good Day), an Academy Award nomination as an actress (Pete Kelly's Blues), ardent fans (ranging from Duke Ellington to Rudolf Nureyev), and top nightclub engagements at $25,000 a week. They have also brought her serious illness...
Peggy always trusted her instinct in such matters, and it kept her close to the big time for a dozen years, while V-2-type careers were exploding all around her. She was singing before she could talk properly, back in Jamestown, N.Dak., where she was born Norma Egstrom 32 years ago. Eventually, she got up the nerve to give Hollywood a teen-age whirl, got a singing job at $2 a night, but soon landed back home with an overstrained throat that required five operations. After that, she had to learn to sing softly...
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