Remembering Steve Lawrence: (Born Sidney Liebowitz; July 8, 1935 – March 7, 2024) R I P

Remembering Steve Lawrence: (Born Sidney Liebowitz; July 8, 1935 – March 7, 2024) R I P

Steve Lawrence (born Sidney Liebowitz; July 8, 1935 – March 7, 2024) was an American singer, comedian, and actor, best known as a member of a duo with his wife Eydie Gormé, billed as "Steve and Eydie", and for his performance as Maury Sline, the manager and friend of the main characters in The Blues Brothers. Steve and Eydie first appeared together as regulars on Tonight Starring Steve Allen in 1954 and continued performing as a duo until Gormé's retirement in 2009

Lawrence was born as Sidney Liebowitz to Jewish parents in the borough of Brooklyn in New York City. His father, Max, was a cantor at the Brooklyn synagogue Beth Sholom Tomchei Harav. His mother, Helen, was a homemaker. He attended Thomas Jefferson High School. During his high school years, Lawrence earned some money after school singing for songwriters in the Brill Building.

Lawrence and Gormé married on December 29, 1957, at the El Rancho Vegas in Las Vegas, Nevada. They had two sons together; David Nessim Lawrence (b. 1960) is an ASCAP Award-winning composer, who wrote the score for High School Musical, and Michael Robert Lawrence (1962–1986), who died suddenly from ventricular fibrillation resulting from an undiagnosed heart condition at the age of 23. Michael was an assistant editor for a television show at the time of his death and was apparently healthy despite a previous diagnosis of slight arrhythmia.

Gormé and Lawrence were in Atlanta, Georgia, at the time of Michael's death, having performed at the Fox Theater the night before. Upon learning of the death, family friend Frank Sinatra sent his private plane to fly the couple to New York to meet David, who was attending school at the time. Following their son's death, Gormé and Lawrence took a year off before touring again.

Eydie Gormé died on August 10, 2013, at age 84, after a brief, undisclosed illness.

In June 2019, following public speculation about his health, Lawrence announced that he was in the early stages of Alzheimer's disease and that treatment to slow its progression had so far been successful.

Lawrence died from complications due to Alzheimer's disease in Los Angeles, on March 7, 2024, at the age of 88.