Claudine Longet Biography | Claudine Longet

Claudine Longet(full name: Claudine Georgette Longet) is a French-American singer, actress, dancer, and recording artist who was popular during the 1960s and 1970s.

Longet was married to American singer and television entertainer Andy Williams from 1961 until 1975. She has maintained a private profile since 1977, following her conviction for negligent homicide in connection with the death of her boyfriend, former Olympic skier Spider Sabich.

Born on January 29, 1942, in Paris France, Claudine Longet went on to enjoy a singing career, recording several albums from 1967 to 1972. She wed crooner Andy Williams in 1961, with the couple going on to have three children. She also pursued acting, appearing on TV series like McHale’s Navy as well as various specials and the 1968 Peter Sellers’ film The Party. After splitting from Williams, Longet began a relationship with skiing pro-Vladimir Sabich, relocating to Aspen. Sabich was found dead on March 21, 1976, after being shot, and Longet was charged with manslaughter. She was eventually found guilty of criminal negligence and served 30 days.

Claudine Longet Age

Claudine was born on 29 January 1942, in Paris, France. She is [agecalc birthdate=1942-01-29] old.

Claudine Longet Family

• Andy Williams
  Former spouse
• Spider Sabich
  Former partner
• Noelle Williams
  Daughter
• Christian Williams
  Son
• Danielle Longet
  Sister
• Robert Williams
  Son
• Ron Austin
  Spouse

Claudine Longet Image

Claudine Longet Photo

Is She Still Alive, Where Is Claudine Longet Now?

The veteran actress and singer is very much alive and living happily with her husband Ronald Austin and they are said to reside in their home in Aspens.
There have been so many questions surrounding the recent activities of the French actress and our findings revealed that Claudine Longet is currently living a quiet life away from the spotlight which was a decision made after Vladimir family’s lawsuit against her. Although the case was later resolved outside of court, Claudine had to agree to the family’s terms and conditions not to write nor speak of her involvement with Vladimir nor the unfortunate things that later happened.

Family: Husband, Children

Flipping over her to marital life, it is worth knowing that the veteran entertainer first got married to Andy Williams, an American singer she met in Las Vegas. Their future romantic entanglement and marriage started after Williams offered to help fix her car and the two got connected, subsequently making their relationship official in 1961 when they wedded. The union gave rise to three children Noëlle, Christian, and Robert, but the marriage, unfortunately, ended in 1975.

After the end of her first marriage, Claudine started dating Vladimir Spider Sabich, an Olympic world champion skier.
The pair became so close that Claudine Longet had to relocate to Aspen, Colorado, with her children to stay with her new found lover. However, after one year of romance, the relationship crumbled after Vladimir was found in his own pool of blood, and a gun was seen on her.
She was arrested and charged with the murder of Vladimir Spider Sabich, although she revealed during the trails that the shooting was accidental as she was trying to learn how to make use of the gun. With no strings attached, it was known that her former husband, Williams was with her all through the process and even helped her pay all the fees involved. Claudine was at the end convicted of negligent homicide and a sentence was passed on her to pay a token fine including thirty days in prison.
Irrespective of the scandal she faced, the French actress and singer found love once again and this time, it was with Ronald Duane Austin, her defense lawyer during the murder case. The duo got married in 1985 and has since been together till date.

Claudine Longet Career

Her first appearances as an actress on television were in two 1963 episodes of the comedy series McHale’s Navy. She also acted in the 1964 theatrical feature film of the same title. Many of her acting roles during the 1960s were in episodes of television adventure series that included Twelve O’Clock High, Combat!, The Name of the Game, The Rat Patrol and Hogan’s Heroes Episode #20: It Takes a Thief … Sometimes. Longet was cast as Sharhri Javid in the 1965 episode”The Silent Dissuaders” of the NBC education drama series, Mr. Novak, starring James Franciscus.

She appeared many times on The Andy Williams Show series and specials. She also occasionally appeared as a singer on other variety and music programs, including those of singers Bobby Darin and Tom Jones. Williams described Longet as “a beautiful, athletic, slender, petite brunette with large doe eyes–my favorite French singer.”

Her career breakthrough occurred in 1966. She had a guest-starring role in the season-one finale of the NBC television adventure series Run for Your Life, which starred Ben Gazzara. In the episode “The Sadness of A Happy Time” she performed her English-French bilingual rendition of Antônio Carlos Jobim’s bossa nova song “Meditation” (“Meditação”). The episode was first broadcast on 16 May 1966.

A&M Records co-founder Herb Alpert was among the viewers whom Longet charmed with her performance of “Meditation”. When Alpert met Longet by happenstance at a club in New Orleans later in 1966, he offered her a recording contract with his company. Longet recorded singles, and five albums, for A&M Records between 1966 and 1970.
“Meditation” was Longet’s first single release for A&M. Other Jobim compositions that she has recorded include “A Felicidade,” “How Insensitive” (“Insensatez”), and “Dindi”.
In 1968, Longet costarred with Peter Sellers in the MGM motion picture The Party, a box office hit that Blake Edwards wrote, produced, and directed. Longet sang “Nothing to Lose” (music by Henry Mancini and lyrics by Don Black) in the film.
In 1971, she joined Williams’s Barnaby Records label. She released singles and two albums for Barnaby, We’ve Only Just Begun in 1971 and Let’s Spend the Night Together in 1972. She also recorded songs for a projected third album for Barnaby that went unreleased. Many of the songs for the planned third album finally appeared on the 1993 compact disc release titled Sugar Me, after the Lynsey de Paul song that Longet covered in the early ’70s, but the masters for some of the other songs are missing and presumed lost.

In 1975, she appeared as “The Flower” (a nonsinging role) with Richard Burton, Jonathan Winters, and others, on the children’s album The Little Prince, based on the Antoine de Saint Exupéry novel. The album won the Grammy Award for Best Album for Children in 1976.

She has enjoyed success on the music popularity charts. Her 1967 debut album, Claudine, peaked at #11 on the Billboard pop albums chart in the United States. Claudine became an RIAA-certified gold album, selling more than 500,000 copies. Subsequent albums The Look of Love peaked at #33 in 1967 and Love is Blue peaked at #29 in 1968 on the Billboard pop albums chart in the U.S.

Longet’s musical cohort on her charting albums was arranger Nick De Caro. He also arranged her other two albums on A&M, Colours (1968) and Run Wild, Run Free (1970), and We’ve Only Just Begun on Barnaby.

She also has had hit singles in America on the Billboard Adult Contemporary chart. Her charting singles include her cover version of “Here, There and Everywhere” (music and lyrics by John Lennon and Paul McCartney), “Hello, Hello” (composed by Terry MacNeil and Peter Kraemer), “Good Day Sunshine” (composed by Lennon and McCartney), “Small Talk” (music and lyrics by Garry Bonner and Alan Gordon), and “Love is Blue”, a 1967 Eurovision Song Contest entry that gained fourth place (music by André Popp and French lyrics by Pierre Cour [Pierre Lemaire]).

‘Another song, “Wanderlove” (music and lyrics by Mason Williams), went to #7 on the singles charts in Singapore and still occasionally gets airplay on Asian radio. She remains popular in Japan, where all of her original albums were reissued on compact disc.

Claudine Longet Marriage to Andy Williams

Longet and Williams met in Las Vegas in 1960 while she was dancing the lead in the Folies Bergère revue at the Tropicana Resort & Casino. Longet was having trouble with her car and had pulled over to the side of the road. Driving by, Williams stopped to offer assistance. She was 18 and he was 32. They married on 15 December 1961 in Los Angeles and had three children: Noëlle (born on 24 September 1963), Christian (born on 15 April 1965), and Robert (“Bobby”) (born on 1 August 1969). They legally separated in 1970 and divorced in January 1975. According to Williams, they remained “very good friends.”

Friendship with Robert F. and Ethel Kennedy
See also: Assassination of Robert F. Kennedy
Longet and Andy Williams were close friends of Senator Robert F. Kennedy and his wife, Ethel Kennedy. During the mid-1960s, the couple hosted the Kennedys at their residences in Bel Air and Palm Springs and spent time at the Kennedy residences at Hickory Hill and New York City. They also took summer cruises together on the Salmon River in central Idaho and on the Colorado River.

On or before 4 June 1968, the day of the 1968 Democratic Party presidential primary in California, Kennedy — a contending Democratic presidential candidate — and his wife made tentative arrangements with Williams and Longet to visit Los Angeles’s The Factory nightclub. According to Williams, Robert Kennedy told them that he would make a hand signal at the conclusion of his televised speech at the Ambassador Hotel to confirm their get-together.

Shortly after midnight on 5 June, Longet and Williams were watching Senator Kennedy’s televised primary victory speech in Kennedy’s suite at The Ambassador and saw Kennedy make the “little hand gesture.” When Williams rushed down to the hotel ballroom, he heard loud noises in the hallway and learned that Kennedy had been shot.

Longet and Williams eventually joined Kennedy’s family and friends at Good Samaritan Hospital in Los Angeles, where doctors labored to save the senator’s life. They stayed at the hospital for 24 hours. After Kennedy died during the early morning hours of 6 June, Longet and Williams went into his hospital room and saw Ethel Kennedy asleep near the body of her late husband.

Longet and Williams attended Kennedy’s funeral at St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York City on 8 June. A television camera captured Williams consoling a sobbing Longet during the Mass. After Kennedy’s brother, Edward M. “Ted” Kennedy, delivered a brief and emotional eulogy, Williams and a choir sang “The Battle Hymn of the Republic” in what a Washington Post reporter described as a “hauntingly slow tempo.” Outside the cathedral on the streets of New York, thousands of people were listening to the Mass over loudspeakers. When they heard Williams singing, they began singing with him.

After the funeral mass, Longet and Williams accompanied Ethel Kennedy, Ted Kennedy, and other Kennedy family members on the 21-car funeral train that took Senator Kennedy’s body to Washington, D.C., and Arlington National Cemetery for burial. The front page of the 9 June 1968 edition of the Washington Post featured a large photograph of Ted Kennedy and Longet standing together on the rear platform as the train passed through North Philadelphia.
Longet and Williams named their son Robert (born in August 1969) after Robert F. Kennedy.

Claudine Longet Songs

• Claudine LongetSongs
  Love Is Blue
  Love Is Blue · 1968
• I Think It’s Gonna Rain Today
  Colors · 1968
• Meditation
  Claudine · 1967
• Who Broke Your Heart
  1999
• A Man and a Woman
  Claudine · 1967
• Both Sides Now
  Colors · 1968

• Walk in the Park
  Love Is Blue · 1968
• Here, There and Everywhere
  Claudine · 1967
• Good Day Sunshine
  The Look of Love · 1967
• Wanderlove
  Claudine · 1967
• Small Talk
  Love Is Blue · 1968
• God Only Knows
  Our Little Corner of the World: Music from Gilmore Girls · 2002

• It’s Hard to Say Goodbye
  Love Is Blue · 1968
• I Love How You Love Me
  The Look of Love · 1967
• Who Needs You
  Love Is Blue · 1968
• Jealous Guy / Don’t Let Me Down
  Let’s Spend the Night Together · 1972
• Hello, Hello
  Claudine · 1967
• Man in a Raincoat
  The Look of Love · 1967

• Hurry on Down
  Colors · 1968
• Sleep Song
  Let’s Spend the Night Together · 1972
• The Look of Love
  The Look of Love · 1967
• Sunrise, Sunset
  Claudine · 1967
• White Horses
  2005
• Let’s Spend the Night Together
  Let’s Spend the Night Together · 1972
• Am I Blue?
  Colors · 1968
• Snow
  Love Is Blue · 1968
• Sleep Safe & Warm
  1998

• The End of the World
  The Look of Love · 1967
• Until It’s Time for You to Go
  Claudine · 1967
• How Insensitive
  The Look of Love · 1967
• Ain’t No Mountain High Enough
  We’ve Only Just Begun · 1971
• Think of Rain
  The Look of Love · 1967

Claudine Longet Arrest and trial

Longet was arrested and charged with fatally shooting her boyfriend, Olympic skier Vladimir “Spider” Sabich, at his Aspen, Colorado, home on 21 March 1976. At her trial, Longet said the gun discharged accidentally as Sabich was showing her how it worked. Williams publicly supported Longet throughout the trial, paid for her legal defense team, and even escorted her to and from the courthouse. Asked later about his unwavering support of his ex-wife, Williams said, “She is the mother of my children and we never stopped being friends. We just didn’t want to be married anymore.”

The Aspen police made two procedural errors that aided Longet’s defense: without warrants, they took a blood sample from her and confiscated her diary. According to prosecutors, the sample showed the presence of cocaine in her blood, and her diary reportedly contradicted her claim that her relationship with Sabich had not soured.

To further muddle the prosecution’s case, the gun was mishandled by non-weapons-experts. prosecutors used the autopsy report to suggest that when Sabich was shot he was bent over, facing away, and at least 1.80 m (6 ft) from Longet, which would be inconsistent with the position and relative distance of someone demonstrating the operation of a firearm.

The jury convicted her of negligent homicide and sentenced her to pay a small fine and spend thirty days in jail. The judge allowed Longet to choose the days to be served, believing this arrangement would allow her to spend time with her children. She chose to serve most of her sentence on weekends. Critical reaction to the verdict and sentencing was exacerbated when she subsequently vacationed with her defense attorney, Ronald D. Austin, who was married at the time; Longet and Austin later married and still live in Aspen.

After the criminal trial, the Sabich family initiated civil proceedings in order to sue Longet. The case was eventually resolved out of court, with the provision that Longet never discuss or write about the killing or the settlement.

Claudine Longet Net Worth

Claudine Longet has emerged as a recognized singer when released her music album ‘Claudine’ in 1967 and spread out her fame around the music arena largely. Her net worth is $19 MILLION

Claudine Longet Albums

• Love Is Blue
  1968
• Claudine
  1967
• Let’s Spend the Night Together
  1972
• The Look of Love
  1967
• We’ve Only Just Begun
  1971
• Run Wild, Run Free
  1970
• Colors
  1968
• Sugar Me
  1999
• Lost Christmas 2 – Holiday Rarities
  2015

Claudine Longet Love Is Blue