Janie Sell, a veteran of Broadway musicals who received a Tony Award in 1974 for her spirited turn opposite The Andrews Sisters in the patriotic Over Here!, has died. She was 86.
Sell died June 9 after a brief illness at Englewood Hospital in Englewood, New Jersey, friend and actor James Dybas reported.
The Detroit native also appeared on Broadway alongside Joel Grey in 1968-69’s George M!, opposite Debbie Reynolds in 1973-74’s revival of Irene, with brothers Dick and Tommy Smothers in I Love My Wife in 1978-79, in 1976’s revival of Pal Joey and in 1977’s Happy End with Christopher Lloyd.
In the World War II-set Over Here!, Sell portrayed Mitzi, a Marlene Dietrich-like German spy with a radio transmitter in her lipstick, alongside big band legends Patty and Maxene Andrews (the oldest of the three sisters, LaVerne, died in 1967).
Sell “is quite a knockout in her own right, and she blends very well with The Andrews Sisters, both physically and vocally,” Clive Barnes wrote in his review for The New York Times.
With music and lyrics by brothers Richard Sherman and Robert Sherman, the production ran for 341 performances. (Also in the cast: youngsters Marilu Henner, John Travolta and Treat Williams.)
Jane Ann Sell was born in Detroit on Oct. 1, 1939. She performed on stages downtown as a child and in several USO shows organized by her mother, Sally, then moved to New York in her early 20s and made ends meet doing commercials before finding work on the stage.
In 1979, she starred as Sylvia Rosewater in composer Alan Menken’s first produced musical, Kurt Vonnegut’s God Bless You Mr. Rosewater. Earlier, she replaced Bernadette Peters as the lead in the off-Broadway musical spoof Dames at Sea.
In the ’90s, Sell attended Hunter College and eventually worked as a personal assistant to Peter Georgescu, chairman of Young & Rubicam Worldwide. However, she was back to Broadway in 1995 to serve as a standby and substitute for Carol Burnett in Moon Over Buffalo.
Survivors include her son, Jason. Her two husbands, businessman Earl Fries and longtime NBC News journalist Pat Trese (he wrote the 2001 PBS documentary series America Goes to War, narrated by Eric Sevareid), predeceased her.