Famous In Life, Noted In Passing

Art Buchwald, 81 His Pulitzer Prizewinning columns found humor in odd places: East Germany, foster care and, of course, American politics. But he saved his most surprising laugh lines for last: writing about his own death—or, rather, about how he hadn't died, despite his doctors' predictions. "Instead of going upstairs," he wrote after walking out of his hospice, "I am going to Martha's Vineyard."

Deborah Kerr, 86 She waltzed with Yul Brynner ("The King and I"), donned a nun's habit ("Black Narcissus") and stood up Cary Grant ("An Affair to Remember"). The ladylike Kerr eroticized her image in "From Here to Eternity," tangling in the waves with Burt Lancaster. She got six Oscar nominations; she never won, but she had great taste in costars.

Kurt Vonnegut, 84 Call his novels satire, sci-fi or fantasy—generations of hip young readers ate them up. As a POW of the Nazis, he witnessed the American firebombing of Dresden; two decades later, it inspired "Slaughterhouse-Five." He tried metafiction ("This is a very bad book you're writing," he wrote in "Breakfast of Champions"), graphic art and political polemics—all with notable success.

E. Howard Hunt Jr., 88CIA agent, spy novelist, Watergate felon, Zelig of the dark side—Hunt wore more hats than just his snappy fedora. He helped plan the 1954 coup in Guatemala and the 1961 Bay of Pigs invasion as well as the 1972 break-in at the DNC headquarters. On tape in 2007, he dished deathbed dirt about JFK's assassination: you don't want to know.

Porter Wagoner, 80 Yes, he made Dolly a star. But the pompadoured, Nudie-suited singer had a warm, down-home delivery and a string of hits: "A Satisfied Mind" (1955) and "The Green, Green Grass of Home" (1965). On recent CDs, his voice sounds timeworn—and enriched.

Joey Bishop, 89 Bishop didn't drink or raise hell much, and he was often overshadowed by the wilder members of the Rat Pack: Frank, Dean, Sammy, Peter Lawford. But he wrote most of the lines they spoke for their legendary "Summit Meeting" shows at the Sands in Las Vegas, though he liked to ad-lib his own stuff. "Marilyn," he once called out when Monroe, in white ermine, arrived in the middle of his comedy act, "I told you to wait in the truck."