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at IMDB.com:
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Website updated December 18, 2011
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IMPORTANT: Susan Gordon passed away on December 11, 2011.
... appeared in The Five Pennies with Danny Kaye, The Twilight Zone, My Three Sons, Attack of the Puppet People and many other films and TV shows!
Susan Gordon was a very modest woman and did not brag about her career, but we wish to brag about her career a bit for her now that she is no longer with us. In early-2005 Susan worked with us to produce a 30-minute documentary of her career. Hundreds of her fans had the opportunity to watch this documentary at various autograph shows and filmfests the past 7 years. We learned a lot about her career in the process of making the documentary. What we'd like the public to know about Susan Gordon's career is this — the common conception that her career was only her appearance in a few films is a misconception, as her TV appearances were very noteworthy. Susan's 30+ appearances on TV shows included many lead performances in those TV episodes. For instance, in the Gunsmoke episode "Little Girl," Susan didn't just appear as a small player in the episode, Susan Gordon WAS the lead "little girl" referenced in the episode's title. In her appearance on Make Room for Daddy, Susan played the lead child in "Danny & the Brownies." Her legendary appearance on The Twilight Zone (season 3, episode 25: "The Fugitive") was also a lead performance in that episode. On Alfred Hitchcock Presents (season 6, episode 15: "Summer Shade"), again, lead role in the episode. Many of her television appearances were central to the plots of the episodes she appeared in. And you really must know that this "little girl" couldn't have done all these things all by herself. Always by Susan Gordon's side through her impressive years as a child actress (1958-1967) was Susan Gordon's amazing mother, Flora M. Lang (Flora M. Gordon), taking Susan to auditions, rehearsals, and filmings, while helping with all else that was involved in Susan's surreal time as a child star.
B.I.G. NEWS: Bert I. Gordon's autobiography has been published! Click here for more information and to order a copy of The Amazing Colossal World of Mr. B.I.G..
The Five Pennies and The Boy and the Pirates have been released on DVD!
Susan Gordon appeared at five film festivals with Bert I. Gordon: October 15-17, 2010 at Festival of Fantastic Films, in Manchester, UK; April 9-11, 2010 at Monsterpalooza; March 15 and 16, 2008 at the Ray Courts CHICAGO Show, Chicago, Illinois; and June 20-22, 2008 & June 25-27, 2010 at the Monster Bash 2008 & 2010 in Pittsburgh, PA.
On the music scene, a vintage singing performance from Miss Susan Gordon's past was released on CD — the soundtrack from the 1959 film classic The Five Pennies (the title song was nominated for the "Best Song" Oscar and the album was nominated for "Best Score, Musical" at the 1959 Academy Awards). Susan appears on two tracks from this Oscar-nominated soundtrack — singing along with Danny Kaye on "Music Goes Round and Round," and singing "The Five Pennies," in counterpoint to Danny Kaye and Jazz-legend Louis Armstrong on "Goodnight, Sleep Tight Medley." From her vocal performance alone, one can understand why legendary Hollywood Columnist Walter Winchell, after seeing her performance in The Five Pennies said of Susan Gordon that she is "the most talented child actress since Miss Temple." The recording was released to CD in March 2004. Susan Gordon returned to the recording studio for the first time since childhood and contributed a spirited rendition of "You're a Dolly" on a CD compilation titled Jeepers Creepers: Great Songs From Horror Films (released in September 2003). This tuneful melody is from the 1958 film Attack of the Puppet People, the movie in which the then 8-year-old Susan Gordon made her big screen debut. Originally performed in the film by Marlene Willis, a now grown-up Susan Gordon has contributed a splendid new version to the CD, Jeepers Creepers: Great Songs From Horror Films.
A personal message from Susan Gordon (October 12, 2007):
On the acting front, Susan returned to performing in 2002 appearing in the off-Broadway production A Magic Place In A New Time at The 45th Street Theatre in New York City. Also in 2002, she added her voice to a commentary track for a DVD of her father, Bert I. Gordon's, sci-fi classic The Beginning of the End. These projects are just the latest in a storied acting career in which as a young actress Miss Gordon appeared in film and television with the likes of Danny Kaye, Louis Armstrong, Ronald Reagan, Rod Serling, Danny Thomas, Joan Fontaine, Angela Cartwright, Zsa Zsa Gabor, Don Ameche, Fred Astaire, Gene Kelly, Alan Ladd, Tuesday Weld, Carolyn Jones, Richard Carlson, Joe Turkel, Charles Herbert, James Franciscus, Nancy Kulp, Ed Wynn, Fred McMurray, James Arness, Dennis Weaver, Leslie Nielsen, James Whitmore, Ed Asner, J. Pat O'Malley, Efrem Zimbalist, Jr., Donna Reed, and many other noted actors and actresses of the big and small screen.
In addition to the many personal appearances she has made in recent years, Susan Gordon has also appeared in interviews in Fangoria Magazine (issue #218), the Horror-wood.com webzine, in the UK publication TV Zone in a series on child actors of the 1960's/1970's called The Children of Science Fiction, on the Jersey's Talking television interview show hosted by Lee Leonard, as well as in a book about Louis Armstrong, written by Scott Allen Nollen, titled Louis Armstrong: The Life, Music, and Screen Career. She also contributed a tape recorded interview while at the 2002 Twilight Zone convention for the Twilight Zone archives. In January 2005, the latest issue of Twilight Zone trading cards was released featuring Susan's personally autographed card (shown at left).
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As a young actress, Susan Gordon had featured roles in six motion pictures, guest-starred in nearly thirty popular television shows, and performed in a live performance of The Miracle on 34th Street which aired on NBC on Thanksgiving Friday in 1959. Her movie credits included: The Five Pennies; Attack of the Puppet People; The Man in the Net; Tormented; The Boy and the Pirates; and Picture Mommy Dead. Her more than two dozen television roles included a diverse group of television productions, including: The Twilight Zone, Gunsmoke, Alfred Hitchcock Presents, The Donna Reed Show, and My Three Sons. Interestingly, Susan appeared in four separate episodes of My Three Sons but played a different character each time. 
When we finally completed the documentary for Susan, and screened it on a projector for her for the first time, she watched in awe of herself. After it was finished playing, she turned to us and said, "Wow! I had no idea I was so famous!" Neither did we, as so many of her wonderful performances had been seemingly lost to us forever before she brought us her collection of manually-recorded videocassettes. In recent years it has been learned that many other seemingly-lost performances of Susan Gordon are still alive and well. For example, Richard Finegan discovered that the Library of Congress has in its collection Kinescope copies of some of Susan's "lost performances." Incredibly, Mr. Finegan discovered there a Kinescope copy of the "Miracle on 34th Street" presentation that was shown on NBC only on November 27, 1959! Hopefully, as the years go by, more of her lost performances will be found.
Special Notice (December 16, 2009): Susan Gordon attended a performance of 
A personal message from Susan Gordon:
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"My candle burns at both ends; It will not last the night; But ah, my foes, and oh, my friends - It gives a lovely light." — Edna St. Vincent Millay |
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Susan Gordon
b. July 27, 1949 in St. Paul, Minnesota — d. December 11, 2011 in Teaneck, New Jersey A message from the webmasters of Susan's official website: Susan was last able to speak to us on November 8, 2011. Her final words in the conversation were: "I need to sleep" — she seemed to be consciously avoiding the word "goodbye" in ending conversations with us in her final months. Susan loved life and she did not wish to concede that she had reached the end of her journey. As a result, she did not advise us what to say on her official website after she was gone. We will just mention a few things we know from having been Susan's friends for 15 years.
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Two roads diverged in a yellow wood, |
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Susan did not like football, yet her final days called to mind a film about a football player. To paraphrase the epilogue from Brian's Song: Susan Gordon died of cancer at the age of 62. She left behind a great many loving family members and friends who miss her and think of her often. But when they think of her, it's not how she died that they remember - but how she lived. How she did live!
Susan's friends, |
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Susan Gordon TV episodes & films currently on Netflix Watch Instantly The Twilight Zone — "The Fugitive" (Season 3, episode 25) The Boy & the Pirates The Man in the Net Attack of the Puppet People |
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The Hollywood Reporter: Susan Gordon, Child Actress of the ’50s and ’60s, Dies at 62
Variety: Susan Gordon dies at 62 |
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Susan Gordon loved her family, friends and fans. She also loved laughing, dancing, singing, acting, traveling, cooking, creating, dreaming, watching movies, falling asleep while watching movies, attending SAG screenings, meeting new people, chatting with friends, playing board games, taking cruises, tutoring math, conducting cooking classes, telling jokes, gushing about her children's accomplishments, holding her grandchildren, visiting her mom and dad in California, talking to her sisters on the phone, helping friends, hosting large gatherings in her home, gazing at autumn leaves, and living life to its fullest. She loved the music of Jim Brickman, The Beatles, Norah Jones, Dido, the girl groups of the 1960s, and many others. She liked Musicals (especially Chicago) and was obsessed with Romantic Comedy films (we had the good fortune to be able to visit Susan in her home on October 17, 2011 for what turned out to be our final "movie nite," to watch one of her all-time favorite films with her: Some Like it Hot.)
Susan enjoyed traveling and traveled to approximately 50 different countries in her lifetime (she got off to a quick start by visiting 32 countries while attending 3 semesters on World Campus Afloat — circa 1967-1968.) Her favorite country to travel to was Japan. Susan lived in Japan for nearly 13 years after graduating college, and it was while in Japan that she met her future husband (the photo at right is of Susan with her youngest son, and was taken during a 1997 visit to Kyoto, Japan. This photo was scanned for a photo-video DVD we created for his Bar Mitzvah.) Beginning with her oldest daughter's wedding in 2002, Susan's life was blessed with the joy of her children's engagements and weddings, and she adored all of her sons-in-law & daughters-in-law. In December 2006 her first grandchild was born. In the years since, more grandchildren arrived, further adding to the joy that her large family brought to her life. In addition to her personal life, Susan took pride in her work as the Chief Information Officer for an industrial products company for the past 21 years, a company she helped to found with her husband and some dear friends. Also, Susan especially enjoyed working with computers (and the latest gadgets) and returned to college ten years ago to pursue a Master's degree in Computer Graphics. Susan Gordon liked the poetry of Edna St. Vincent Millay and she felt a special connection to a poem by Robert Frost:
