Elke Sommer, the German actress behind A Shot in the Dark, dies at 85

Elke Sommer, the German actress who played a maid in the Pink Panther sequel A Shot in the Dark, has died. She was 85. Bild magazine reported that she passed away in Los Angeles due to heart failure.

Sommer was born Elke Schletz in 1940 in Berlin. Her father was a Protestant pastor. Her family moved to Bavaria during World War II. She intended to work as an interpreter. In 1958, she won a beauty contest in Italy. Vittorio De Sica, a celebrated Italian director, saw her and offered her roles in comedy films.

She transitioned to more serious work with the West German drama The Death Ship. She acted opposite Horst Buchholz in that film. Buchholz later appeared in The Magnificent Seven. Sommer spoke multiple languages. She made her first English-language film in 1961 with the British comedy Don’t Bother to Knock. She starred alongside Richard Todd in that project.

In 1963, Carl Foreman cast her in The Victors. The film listed her among the six most exciting women in the world. That list also included Melina Mercouri, Jeanne Moreau, and Romy Schneider. Her Hollywood breakthrough came the same year in The Prize. She played the lover of Paul Newman in an adaptation of an Irving Wallace novel. She shared a Golden Globe for most promising newcomer for that role.

Her career accelerated with A Shot in the Dark. She played a maid suspected of murders in the sequel to The Pink Panther. Peter Sellers starred in that film. She leaned into a bombshell image for the role. She then appeared in The Art of Love with James Garner and Dick Van Dyke. She also starred in The Oscar with Stephen Boyd. She acted in the Bob Hope comedy Boy, Did I Get a Wrong Number! in 1968.

Sommer achieved leading actor status in 1968 with The Wicked Dreams of Paula Schultz. The film followed an East German athlete who pole-vaulted over the Berlin Wall. In the 1970s, she appeared in two horror films by Mario Bava: Baron Blood and Lisa and the Devil. She also starred in the sex comedies Percy and Percy’s Progress, directed by Ralph Thomas.

She took on high-profile British roles in the mid-1970s. She played secretary Vera Clyde in the 1974 Agatha Christie adaptation And Then There Were None. She appeared in Carry on Behind in 1975. That film was the 27th entry in the Carry On series. She later starred in The Prisoner of Zenda and A Nightingale Sang in Berkeley Square.

Sommer reduced her screen appearances to focus on painting. She became embroiled in a feud with Zsa Zsa Gabor in the mid-1980s. They appeared together on the TV show Circus of the Stars. A court awarded Sommer 3.3 million dollars in damages for defamation. She was married to writer Joe Hyams from 1964 to 1981. She married hotelier Wolf Walther in 1993. Walther died in 2026.