It’s one of those Hollywood trivia bits that pops up every time The Munsters comes on. "Hey, did you notice Marilyn looks different?" Most fans know that Beverley Owen, the original Marilyn, left the show after only 13 episodes. She was replaced by Pat Priest. But while her exit from the 1313 Mockingbird Lane house was a major TV drama back in 1964, the story of her final years is much quieter. And, honestly, much more tragic.
People often search for the Beverley Owen cause of death expecting some sort of scandalous Hollywood ending. Maybe they think she disappeared because of some bitter feud or a sudden accident.
The reality is far more human.
Beverley Owen died on February 21, 2019. She was 81 years old. She wasn't in a hospital in Los Angeles or under the bright lights of a movie set. She was at home. Specifically, her home in Vermont, surrounded by the people she actually cared about—not just co-stars, but her family.
The Long Battle Nobody Knew About
When the news broke that Owen had passed, it took a lot of people by surprise. Her co-star Butch Patrick, who played the little werewolf Eddie Munster, was one of the first to post about it on Facebook. He mentioned how much he had a crush on her when he was a kid. It was sweet. But it also revealed that Owen had been dealing with a serious health struggle for a long time.
Ovarian cancer. That was the official cause. Her daughter, Polly Stone, eventually shared that her mother had been fighting the disease for over two years. She was diagnosed in January 2017.
Think about that for a second. Two years.
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Owen kept the whole thing private. She wasn't looking for a "courageous battle" headline or a magazine cover. She just lived her life. She was an academic, a mother, and a woman who had long ago decided that being "Marilyn" wasn't her whole identity. By the time she was diagnosed, she had been out of the Hollywood limelight for decades. She lived in Londonderry, Vermont, a place far removed from the artificiality of a 1960s soundstage.
Why the privacy matters
In today's world, we expect celebrities to live-tweet their medical charts. Owen didn't. She was old school. She was a woman who valued her peace. Honestly, that’s probably why her death felt like such a shock to the public—she didn't let the world watch her get sick.
What Really Happened with The Munsters?
You can’t talk about how she died without talking about how she lived, and why she left the role that made her famous. There’s a misconception that she was fired or that she hated her castmates.
That's just not true.
Beverley Owen was a trained actress who loved New York. She loved the theater. When she got cast in The Munsters, she basically had to move to California against her will. She was contractually obligated.
She hated it.
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She would cry on set. She missed her fiancé, Jon Stone (who later became a huge deal as a producer for Sesame Street). Her co-stars, Fred Gwynne and Al Lewis, actually stepped in to help her. They saw how miserable she was. They basically encouraged the producers to let her out of her contract so she could go be happy.
She left the show, got married, and basically walked away from a "sure thing" in Hollywood.
- She did 13 episodes.
- She moved back East.
- She stayed married to Jon Stone for about a decade.
- They had two daughters, Polly and Kate.
Life After Marilyn
After she left the show, Owen didn't just sit around. She went back to school. She actually earned a master's degree in Early American History in 1989.
Imagine being a student in a history class and realizing your classmate was the original Marilyn Munster. Sorta wild, right?
She spent much of her later life as a researcher and an academic. This is why the Beverley Owen cause of death feels so disconnected from her "blonde bombshell" image. She hadn't been that person for fifty years. When she died of ovarian cancer in 2019, she was a grandmother and a scholar.
Ovarian cancer is often called the "silent killer" because the symptoms—bloating, pelvic pain, feeling full quickly—are so easy to ignore. By the time Owen was diagnosed in 2017, she was already nearly 80. It’s a brutal disease for anyone, but she managed to keep her dignity and her privacy until the very end.
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The Legacy of the "Normal" One
It’s ironic. In the show, Marilyn was the "ugly" one because she was the only human in a family of monsters. In real life, Owen was the one who chose the most "normal" path. She chose family and education over fame.
When you look back at her career, you see a woman who wasn't afraid to say "no" to the industry. She did a few things after The Munsters—a bit on Another World in the early 70s—but she was mostly done with the grind.
If you’re looking for a takeaway from Beverley Owen’s story, it’s probably that you don’t have to stay in a situation that makes you miserable just because it’s "successful." She quit a hit show to marry the guy she loved. Even though they eventually divorced, she never seemed to regret leaving Hollywood behind.
How to honor her memory
If you’re a fan, the best way to remember her isn't just by watching those first 13 episodes of The Munsters. It’s by recognizing the importance of early detection in women’s health. Ovarian cancer research is still underfunded compared to other types.
What you should do next:
- Educate yourself on symptoms: If you or a loved one are experiencing persistent bloating or pelvic changes, don't write it off as "getting older."
- Watch the original pilot: See Owen without the blonde wig. She was a brunette originally, and she looked much more like herself.
- Support Ovarian Cancer Research: Organizations like the Ovarian Cancer Research Alliance (OCRA) do the heavy lifting that could have changed the outcome for women like Beverley.
She was more than a girl in a blonde wig. She was a woman who lived life on her own terms, right up until her quiet passing in the Vermont woods.