Eartha Kitt, a sultry singer, dancer and actress who rose from South Carolina cotton fields to become an international symbol of elegance and sensuality, has died, a family spokesman said. She was 81.

 

Andrew Freedman said Kitt, who was recently treated at Columbia Presbyterian Hospital, died Thursday in Connecticut of colon cancer.

 

Kitt, a self-proclaimed “sex kitten” famous for her catlike purr, was one of America’s most versatile performers, winning two Emmys and nabbing a third nomination. She also was nominated for several Tonys and two Grammys.

 

Her career spanned six decades, from her start as a dancer with the famed Katherine Dunham troupe to cabarets and acting and singing on stage, in movies and on television. She persevered through an unhappy childhood as a mixed-race daughter of the South and made headlines in the 1960s for denouncing the Vietnam War during a visit to the White House.

 

Through the years, Kitt remained a picture of vitality and attracted fans less than half her age even as she neared 80.

Once dubbed the “most exciting woman in the world” by Orson Welles, she spent much of her life single, though brief romances with the rich and famous peppered her younger years.

 

In 1996, she was nominated for a Grammy in the category of traditional pop vocal performance for her album “Back in Business.” She also had been nominated in the children’s recording category for the 1969 record “Folk Tales of the Tribes of Africa.”

 

Kitt also acted in movies, playing the lead female role opposite Nat King Cole in “St. Louis Blues” in 1958 and more recently appearing in “Boomerang” and “Harriet the Spy” in the 1990s.

 

On television, she was the sexy Catwoman on the popular “Batman” series in 1967-68, replacing Julie Newmar who originated the role. A guest appearance on an episode of “I Spy” brought Kitt an Emmy nomination in 1966.

 

In 1978, Kitt returned to Broadway in the musical “Timbuktu!” — which brought her a Tony nomination — and was invited back to the White House by President Jimmy Carter.

 

In 2000, Kitt earned another Tony nod for “The Wild Party.” She played the fairy godmother in Rodgers and Hammerstein’s “Cinderella” in 2002.

 

As recently as October 2003, she was on Broadway after replacing Chita Rivera in a revival of “Nine.”

 

She also gained new fans as the voice of Yzma in the 2000 Disney animated feature “The Emperor’s New Groove.’”

 

While on stage, she was daringly sexy and always flirtatious. Offstage, however, Kitt described herself as shy and almost reclusive, remnants of feeling unwanted and unloved as a child. She referred to herself as “that little urchin cotton-picker from the South, Eartha Mae.”

 

For years, Kitt was unsure of her birthplace or birth date. In 1997, a group of students at historically black Benedict College in Columbia, S.C., located her birth certificate, which verified her birth date as Jan. 17, 1927. Kitt had previously celebrated on Jan. 26.

 

The research into her background also showed Kitt was the daughter of a white man, a poor cotton farmer.

 

“I’m an orphan. But the public has adopted me and that has been my only family,” she told the Post online. “The biggest family in the world is my fans.”

 

This is an edited version of an article that was written by the Associated Press. Associated Press Drama Writer Michael Kuchwara contributed to this report. You can read the entire AP article by following this link, news.yahoo.com.

 

For further information on Eartha Kitt you can visit her website, earthakitt.com.

 

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