- More from Famously...
- Famous Arrests
- Famous Scandals
- Famous Brands
View information about Inger Stevens's death here on famously-dead.com. You can view information about Inger Stevens's death and other famous deaths. You can view by name or by cause of death. We also have included the most popular famous deaths.
Inger Stevens's Death
- Inger Stevens
- Actress
- October 18, 1934
- April 30, 1970
- Drug Overdose
Born in Sweden, Ingrid Stensland migrated to Kansas with her father when she was thirteen, after her parents divorced. Her teenaged years were troubled, marked by arguments with her stepmother and she was in a Kansas City burlesque show at 16. By the time she turned 18, it was off to New York City to learn how to act in classes at the famous Actor's Studio.
Changing her name, Inger got roles in plays, commercials and on TV, in shows like "Bonanza", "The Twilight Zone" and "The Alfred Hitchcock Hour". She landed her big break with a role in the Bing Crosby film "Man On Fire." But her biggest on scene success was in the "Farmer's Daughter" series on ABC-TV.
After the show was canceled, Inger appeared in some more movies, like this one with Walter Matthau …
Despite her wealth and fame, the Midwestern beauty was said to suffer from loneliness and depression. Feeling despondent on New Year's Day, 1960, she tried to kill herself with sleeping pills – never explaining why, but calling it the stupidest thing she ever did and claiming she was stronger and wiser as a result.
There were two marriages – the first one to her agent Antony Soglio lasting only two years - the second to Ike Jones, a producer and associate of singer Nat King Cole.
But she kept the marriage to Jones a secret for nine years, from 1961 until the time of her death…
…concerned that a marriage to a black man would hurt her career. They didn't have any children.
Plagued by depression, Inger Stevens was found barely conscious in the kitchen of her Hollywood Hills home one spring day by a live-in friend. She died on the way to the hospital with barbiturate overdose. The medical examiner never said whether it was accidental or a suicide.
Inger Stevens was cremated and her ashes were scattered over the Pacific Ocean.