Skip To Content
JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.
Fast Forward

Marty Allen, Wild-Haired ‘Hello Dere’ Comedian, Dies At 95

(JTA) — Marty Allen, the veteran comedian who was part of the popular Allen and Rossi duo and was known for his catchphrase “hello dere,” has died.

Allen died Monday in Las Vegas from complications of pneumonia at the age of 95. He is survived by his wife and performing partner of the last 30 years, Karon Kate Blackwell, who was with him when he died, his spokeswoman told The Associated Press.

His comedy career took off in the late 1950s and ’60s when he performed with Steve Rossi. The tandem appeared 44 times on “The Ed Sullivan Show,” including on the show with the first appearance by the Beatles in February 1964. They also appeared on “The Tonight Show With Johnny Carson” and “The Merv Griffin Show.” After parting in 1968, Martin and Rossi reunited for shows into the 1990s.

Allen made hundreds of television appearances, including in a dramatic role on the series “The Big Valley.” He also was a regular on “The Hollywood Squares” and made guest appearances on numerous game shows.

He and his wife performed comedy routines in Las Vegas and in other venues throughout the country until at least 2016.

Allen was born and raised in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. He served in Italy in the Army Air Corps during World War II, earning a Soldier’s Medal for bravery. He was predeceased by his first wife, Lorraine “Frenchy” Allen.

A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you move on, I wanted to ask you to support the Forward’s award-winning journalism during our High Holiday Monthly Donor Drive.

If you’ve turned to the Forward in the past 12 months to better understand the world around you, we hope you will support us with a gift now. Your support has a direct impact, giving us the resources we need to report from Israel and around the U.S., across college campuses, and wherever there is news of importance to American Jews.

Make a monthly or one-time gift and support Jewish journalism throughout 5785. The first six months of your monthly gift will be matched for twice the investment in independent Jewish journalism. 

—  Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO

Join our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.

Republish This Story

Please read before republishing

We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines. You must credit the Forward, retain our pixel and preserve our canonical link in Google search.  See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.

To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.

We don't support Internet Explorer

Please use Chrome, Safari, Firefox, or Edge to view this site.