Jaye P. Morgan, Who Went Too Far on ‘The Gong Show,’ Dies at 94

August 26, 2026

I know a lot of people are pointing out that Catherine O’Hara, Brenda Fricker and Tim Curry all died this year and all were in Home Alone 2: Lost in New York (1992), suggesting their co-star Donald Trump might be in for a similar fate, but are we overlooking that Jaye P. Morgan was also in that film?

Sadly, Jaye P. died Monday at 94.

I grew up knowing of Jaye P. Morgan only as a raunchy celeb judge on The Gong Show — from which she was fired for exposing her breasts during a particularly spirited Gene Gene the Dancing Machine segment in 1978.

But the former Margaret Morgan had been a very successful singer 20 years before, going Top 10 with “That’s All I Want from You” (1954) and “The Longest Walk” (1955). She racked up many other, lesser, hits through the early ‘60s thanks to her husky vocals and saucy delivery, and even had her own TV show 70 years ago — The Jaye P. Morgan Show (1956).

In 1964, among her many TV guest spots, she played a small part on My Three Sons, singing the catchy “Gonna Getcha,” which I swear was a bit of a Blondie precursor.

She continued on as a singer, including a fun The Muppet Show stint in 1978, but became much more famous as a game-show panelist and talk-show guest. She had the gift of gab and was risqué in her banter.

While she did not act very often, she did play herself in both The Gong Show Movie (1980) and Confessions of a Dangerous Mind (2002), the drama about the show’s emcee, Chuck Barris.

She said of Barris in one of the film’s framing-device interviews:

“We had a great time. The crew loved him and loved the show — because it was crazy. And we could do anything we wanted to — sort of. They liked him, very much. He was a good guy. Even though he was a prick. He’s a good guy, too.”

That became one of her last appearances in a movie or on TV aside from a 2003 run on the umpteenth Hollywood Squares revamp and as an interviewee in the 2013 film about the Continental Baths, Continental.

I know that in recent years Morgan’s family had told fans to stop sending things to sign because she was no longer able to do so.

She was a definite flashback to my youth.⚡️