Obituaries - Dec. 12, 1999

Shirley Hemphill; Star of ‘What’s Happening!!’

Shirley Hemphill, 52, an actress and comedian best known as the wisecracking waitress on the 1970s television sitcom “What’s Happening!!” Hemphill was working as a medical receptionist in her hometown of Asheville, N.C., when she decided to give show business a try. After moving to Los Angeles, she watched stand-up comics and said to herself, “I can do that.” After 18 months of learning and refining a routine, she was doing stand-up around town when Norman Lear saw her one night at the Comedy Store. He liked what he saw and signed her up for “What’s Happening!!” The show focused on three high school students living in a middle-class neighborhood in Los Angeles. Hemphill played the portly waitress Shirley Wilson on the show, which ran from 1976 to 1979. She also appeared on the series “One in a Million” in 1980, followed by a sequel to her 1970s show called “What’s Happening Now!!” It ran from 1985 to 1988. Hemphill also had guest appearances on some TV features since 1992. In the last few years, she had returned to the stand-up comedy circuit. On Friday at her home in West Covina. Police said she apparently died of natural causes.

Niccolo Tucci; Short Story Writer, Novelist

Niccolo Tucci, 91, a writer best known for his autobiographical fiction and his stories in the New Yorker. Born in Lugano, Switzerland, Tucci learned six languages and studied at Amherst College as an exchange student. After getting his doctorate in political science from the University of Florence, Tucci joined Benito Mussolini’s propaganda ministry, but was rebuked in 1936 for altering the text of one of the dictator’s speeches. Tucci moved to New York City in 1938 and devoted himself to anti-fascist propaganda, translating and ghostwriting. In the early 1940s he worked on Latin American policy for Nelson Rockefeller in Washington. Tucci tried to recapture the lost world of childhood in his books and later in short stories written for the New Yorker. His first English novel, “Before My Time” (1962), centered on his Russian grandmother, known as Grossmamachen, a tyrannical matriarch portrayed as a life-giver and a destroyer. Tucci wrote three other books in English and three in Italian and won the Viareggio prize for “Il Segreto” (“The Secret”), a collection of stories written in Italian. He was disdainful of writing awards but once listed among his honors the following: “A letter from James Joyce in 1924, praising me for my Italian fairy tales; a letter from E.B. White to William Shawn [then the editor of the New Yorker] in 1956, saying, ‘One Tucci piece a year, and the New Yorker is in the clear;’ being quoted at length by W.H. Auden in ‘The Dyer’s Hand and Other Essays.’ ” On Friday at his home in Manhattan.

Felix Carter; Christian Methodist Episcopal Official

Felix Carter, 74, a leading layman in the Christian Methodist Episcopal Church. From 1987 to 1995, Carter was president of the church’s Los Angeles-San Diego District Lay Department. For the last four years he had been lay leader of the church’s Southern California Annual Conference. In 1977, Carter was elected first vice president of the 9th Episcopal District Lay Council by the National Lay Institute. Professionally, Carter was a smog inspector for Ford Motor Co. for more than three decades. But he devoted his leisure time to the church, serving the denomination’s Phillips Temple and helping to start its Compton church and more recently the Curry Temple. His wife, Marguerite, said Carter stressed knowledge of religious history and doctrine, and he motivated lay members to serve their local congregations and community. He was a veteran of the Navy. On Nov. 30 in Los Angeles.