Totie, as everyone called Sophie Feldman from Hartford, Connecticut, was a favorite of 1960s TV-variety show host, Ed Sullivan. She built her act on her weight – and her pride in it. But she is better remembered for the unfortunate result of cosmetic surgery than for her comedy.

Fields had diabetes. Surgery for her was risky. But in 1976, not to be deterred, she searched for and found a doctor – actually a huband-wife team – willing to perform a facelift. A month later, post-operative complications led to the loss of a leg. Milking it for comedy, she joked to a cheering audience, “I’ve waited my whole life to say this . . . I now weigh less than Elizabeth Taylor.” Two years later, in 1978, at the age of 48, she died from complications related to her amputation. Her husband reportedly sued the surgeons his wife had talked into operating.