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Suzanne Somers was an American actress, author, singer, and businesswoman. Many people did not know much about her. In this article, we will take a look at her biography, age, cause of death, properties, net worth, and family.

Personal Information and Education

Physical Information

Family Information

Real Estate and Net worth

Social Media

Early Life and Personal Struggles

Childhood in California

Born on October 16, 1946, in San Bruno, California, Suzanne Marie Mahoney was the third child in a working-class Irish-American Catholic family of four. Her father, Francis Mahoney, was a laborer and gardener, and her mother, Marion Elizabeth, worked as a medical secretary. Somers frequently terrified that her violent and alcoholic father would murder her. Up until the age of twelve, Somers was a bedwetter, which resulted in more beating from her father.

When Somers initially enrolled at Mercy High School in Burlingame, California, she struggled academically due to dyslexia and her father’s frequent overnight violent behavior. She also frequently slept off in class. She played the main character in an H.M.S. Pinafore production at school. At fourteen, she was dismissed for sending a boy sexually suggestive notes that were never received.

Suzanne retaliated with a tennis racket to her father, who had torn off her prom dress and called her “nothing,” when she was seventeen.

After graduating from Capuchino High School in San Bruno, California, in 1964, Somers helped plan her class’s senior ball and received the “Best Doll Award” for her performance in the senior musical Guys and Dolls.

Early Marriages and Career Beginnings

The Catholic Society of the Sacred Heart organization ran Lone Mountain College, where she later enrolled. However, she left the school in 1965 after finding out she was pregnant. Days later, at the age of 19, she wed Bruce Somers, the father of her child. Her circumstances made her feel insecure. Her car was seized and she was taken into custody for check fraud.

In 1965, Somers wed Bruce Somers, and in November of that same year, they welcomed a son, Bruce Jr. Following their 1968 divorce, Somers appeared as a prize model on Alan Hamel’s game show, The Anniversary Game. They started dating even though he was already married; their affair resulted in an abortion. The couple wed in 1977. Daisy Hamel-Buffa, Violet Somers, and Camelia Somers were Somers’ three granddaughters.

Her son, who was six years old, was hit by a car in 1971. She sought therapy for both herself and her son as a result of the trauma that ensued. In 1977, Somers and Hamel purchased a home in Palm Springs, California, which they sold for $8.5 million in 2021.

Somers’ house in Malibu, California, was damaged by a wildfire in January 2007. The fire was in Southern California.

Early Career

Somers started her acting career in the late 1960s and early 1970s in tiny roles. She promoted her poetry book and small roles in films, like “Blonde in the White Thunderbird” in American Graffiti, by appearing on a number of talk shows. This led to her being invited to appear on The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson.

Early in the 1970s, she played the femme fatale in an episode of the American sitcom Lotsa Luck, which was based on the British series On the Buses. She also made appearances in The Rockford Files in 1974 and Magnum Force in 1973, where she had an uncredited “pool girl” part. Additionally, she starred as a guest star in the 1977 episode “Cheshire Project” of The Six Million Dollar Man.

She had a cameo in a 1976 episode of One Day at a Time and portrayed a passenger in the debut episode of The Love Boat. She participated as a celebrity panelist on Match Game in 1977 and made an appearance on Tattletales with her husband Alan Hamel.

Three’s Company

ABC president Fred Silverman recommended Somers after she made her debut on The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson. Producers were not impressed by actresses Suzanne Zenor and Susan Lanier during the first two pilot episodes of the ABC sitcom Three’s Company, which was based on the British sitcom Man About the House.

The day before the third and final pilot’s taping started, Silverman recruited her. Christmas “Chrissy” Snow, a working office secretary who personified many stereotypical ideas of blondes, was represented by Somers. Somers initially received $3,500 a week from the show.

In a comedy about two single women living with a single male who pretended to be gay in order to get around the landlord’s rule against single men and women sharing an apartment, the series co-starred John Ritter and Joyce DeWitt. The show debuted to immediate popularity in the Nielsen ratings, leading to the brief creation of a spin-off called The Ropers, which took inspiration from the British sitcom George and Mildred and starred Norman Fell and Audra Lindley.

When the fifth season of Three’s Company premiered in late 1980, Somers sought 10% of the show’s earnings in addition to a pay raise from $30,000 to $15,000 each episode, matching Ritter’s salary. Hamel had an influence on Somers’s request.

Only a $5,000 increase per episode was what ABC was ready to provide. Somers then declined to appear in the season’s second and fourth episodes, claiming injuries including a broken rib. Her role was reduced to just 60 seconds per episode, and she only made an appearance in the show’s closing tag when Chrissy calls the trio’s apartment from her parents’ house. Despite this, she completed the remaining season on her contract.

Somers filed a $2 million lawsuit against ABC, claiming that the network had damaged her reputation in the entertainment industry, after the network sacked her from the show and ended her contract. Due to a single missing episode for which she had not been paid, the arbitrator who concluded the case determined that Somers was only able to receive $30,000. The network and producers also benefited from later decisions. According to Somers, she was dismissed for requesting the same salary as well-known male television celebrities.

After Three’s Company

Suzanne Somers inked a contract with Columbia Pictures Television in 1983 through her company Hamel/Somers Productions. Just before Ritter passed away in 2003, Somers and her co-star on Three’s Company, John Ritter, restored their friendship after a 20-year rift.

In 1980 and 1984, Somers made appearances in two Playboy cover-feature nude pictorials. When Somers was a struggling actress and model in February 1970, Stan Malinowski shot her first series of nude pictures for the magazine during a test session. In 1971, she was approved as a Playmate candidate, but she refused to take a nude photo prior to the shoot.

With the exception of a topless picture from High Society, she denied ever posing nude during an appearance on The Tonight Show in 1980. This led to Playboy releasing images from the 1970 Malinowski shoot without obtaining her consent. Somers initially intended for her nude photo shoot to raise money for medical expenses associated with her son Bruce Jr.’s injuries from a crash with a car.

Her son was fourteen by the time the pictures were released, and Somers worried that he would find it upsetting to see his mother in a nude photo. After suing Playboy, Somers was awarded $50,000 as a settlement; at least $10,000 of that amount was given to Easterseals. In an effort by Somers to reclaim her lost notoriety following the Three’s Company incident in 1981, the second naked photo by Richard Fegley was released in December 1984.

Playboy asked her to take another naked photo earlier that year, but she was upset and reminded of the lawsuit. She was furious again at first, but after talking to her family, she finally accepted. She believed that the second time around, she would have a greater opportunity to manage the image quality, and Somers placed a high value on control over the pose. Somers had previously assumed that her 18-year-old son would not want to see his mother without clothes, but he did see the second picture.

As an entertainer, Somers resided in Las Vegas during the 1980s. He performed as the main attraction at the former MGM Grand, which is now Horseshoe Las Vegas, for two years until the theater burned down, and then for an additional two and a half years at the Las Vegas Hilton, which is now Westgate Las Vegas. Somers entertained American military abroad in the early 1980s.

Somers featured in the first-run syndicated sitcom She’s the Sheriff from 1987 to 1989. Somers acted a widow who chose to take up her late husband’s duty as a Nevada town sheriff in order to support her two small children. There were two seasons of the show.

Somers made a comeback to network television in 1990, making multiple appearances in made-for-TV films and guest parts.

Return to Television

With Patrick Duffy, Somers made a successful comeback to series television in September 1991 with the sitcom Step By Step, which aired on ABC’s TGIF plan targeted towards young adults.

Somers starred in a number of infomercials for the ThighMaster, a training device that is pressed between the thighs above the knees, in the early 1990s. Somers was admitted to the Infomercial Hall of Fame in 2014.

Keeping Secrets, a two-hour biographical drama featuring the actress herself and based on her first autobiography of the same name, aired on ABC in 1991. The film followed Somers’ turbulent youth and family life as well as her future journey to celebrity.

Somers debuted Suzanne Somers, a daytime talk show that ran for one season in 1994. “Step By Step” ran on ABC until the conclusion of its sixth season in 1997, at which point it transferred to CBS for what ended up being its last season.

Somers co-hosted the updated version of the show from 1997 to 1999, when CBS brought it back with Peter Funt. During the 2000s, Somers sold jewelry, clothes, and household goods that she designed while spending more than 25 hours a month on the Home Shopping Network.

A collection of stories about her life and career, The Blonde in the Thunderbird, was Somers’ one-woman show that she debuted on Broadway in the summer of 2005. The performance, which was scheduled to run through September, was canceled in less than a week due to unsatisfactory reviews and low ticket sales.

She laid the responsibility on the negative reviews, calling it “…a drab and embarrassing display of emotional exhibitionism masquerading as entertainment” in the words of the New York Times. She drew even more condemnation when she likened the way her detractors treated her to what happened to soldiers in the Iraq War.

Suzanne Somers Breaking Through, an online chat show, was launched by Somers at CaféMom in 2012. Former co-star Joyce DeWitt from Three’s Company made a comeback and reconciliation in three of the episodes; the two had not spoken or seen one another in thirty-one years. Somers and Dewitt talked briefly about John Ritter and expressed their gratitude for having had a conversation with him just before his untimely passing.

The Suzanne Show, hosted by Somers, debuted on the Lifetime Network in the fall of 2012 and ran for 13 episodes. Somers greeted a variety of people discussing a broad range of fitness and health-related subjects.

Somers was revealed as one of the celebrities taking part in the 20th season of Dancing with the Stars on February 24, 2015. Tony Dovolani, a dance professional, was her partner. In the fifth week of the tournament, Somers and Dovolani were eliminated and placed ninth. Somers starred in “Suzanne Sizzles” at the Westgate Las Vegas in May and June of 2015.

Business Ventures and the ThighMaster

After her departure from Three’s Company, Suzanne Somers reinvented herself as a savvy and highly successful entrepreneur. She often referred to being fired as a “veiled gift” that forced her and her husband, Alan Hamel, to take control of their own brand.

The ThighMaster Phenomenon

In the early 1990s, Somers became a pop culture icon all over again, but this time as a businesswoman. She and Hamel acquired a product called the “V-Toner,” rebranded it as the ThighMaster, and she starred in a series of now-famous infomercials.

​With the simple and memorable tagline, “You just put it between your knees and squeeze,” the ThighMaster became a massive fitness craze. The product was an enormous success, selling over 10 million units and cementing Somers’s status as a marketing powerhouse.

E-commerce and Wellness Brand

The ThighMaster was just the beginning. Somers leveraged her fame into a broad business empire, becoming one of the most recognizable faces on TV shopping channels like the Home Shopping Network (HSN), where she sold her popular jewelry collections.

This evolved into her own successful e-commerce brand, SuzanneSomers.com. The company sells over 1,000 products, all centered on her passion for health and wellness. The product lines include:

• Organic Skincare and Makeup
• Health Supplements
• GUT RENEW and Gut Health Products
• Non-Toxic Household Cleaners
• Fitness Equipment, including the ThighMaster, which is still sold today.

​You can see one of the original, iconic 1991 infomercials in this video.
Original Suzanne Somers ThighMaster Commercial

Health and Medical Advocacy

​A significant part of Suzanne Somers’s later-life fame came from her role as a health and wellness advocate. After her breast cancer diagnosis in 2000, she became a prominent and sometimes controversial voice in the alternative health space.

Her primary platform was her strong advocacy for bioidentical hormone replacement therapy (BHRT), which she promoted as a natural way to combat aging. She detailed this philosophy in her bestselling book, Ageless: The Naked Truth About Bioidentical Hormones.

Somers was also vocal about her personal health choices. When she was diagnosed with breast cancer, she publicly shared her decision to undergo a lumpectomy and radiation but to forgo chemotherapy, which she had concerns about.

These views were often controversial and drew criticism from members of the established medical community and organizations like the American Cancer Society, which cautioned that many of her promoted treatments were scientifically unproven. Despite the controversy, these philosophies became the foundation for her multi-million dollar wellness brand and a central theme in her many bestselling books.

Author and Published Works

Beyond her television and business success, Suzanne Somers was a prolific author, writing over 25 books. She became a #1 New York Times bestselling author, with 14 of her books becoming New York Times bestsellers. Her writing career covered poetry, autobiographies, and, most famously, health and wellness.

Autobiographies

Somers wrote multiple autobiographies detailing her difficult childhood and her life in the spotlight.

• Keeping Secrets (1987): This #1 New York Times bestseller revealed her traumatic upbringing in a family affected by alcoholism. It was later adapted into a TV movie in which she starred as herself.
• After the Fall (1998): This book detailed her career and personal life after her firing from Three’s Company.
• Two’s Company: A Fifty-Year Romance… (2017): She co-wrote this book with her husband, Alan Hamel, about their life and partnership.

Health, Wellness, and Diet Books

Starting in the 1990s, Somers built a health and wellness empire based on her books. She focused on diet (the “Somersize” plan), nutrition, and her advocacy for bioidentical hormone replacement therapy.

Her most popular and controversial health books include:

• Suzanne Somers’ Eat Great, Lose Weight (1996)
• The Sexy Years: Discover the Hormone Connection (2004)
• Ageless: The Naked Truth About Bioidentical Hormones (2006)
• Knockout: Interviews with Doctors Who Are Curing Cancer (2009)
• Sexy Forever: How to Fight Fat after Forty (2010)
• TOX-SICK: From Toxic to Not Sick (2015)
• A New Way to Age (2020)

Her very first published work was a book of poetry in 1973 titled Touch Me.

Legacy and Posthumous AI Project

In late 2025, two years after her death, it was announced that Suzanne Somers’ legacy would be preserved in a unique, modern way: through an “AI twin.”

Her widower, Alan Hamel, revealed that he had partnered with a technology company to create an interactive, AI-powered version of Suzanne. Hamel explained that this was a project the couple had discussed before her passing.

The AI is being trained on the entirety of her life’s work, including all 27 of her published books and hundreds of hours of interviews. The goal of the project is to allow fans, friends, and family to continue to interact with her likeness, ask her questions, and engage with her philosophies on health and life, ensuring her memory and message remain accessible.

Cause of death and 23-Year Cancer Battle

Suzanne Somers passed away at her home in Palm Springs, California, on October 15, 2023, just one day before her 77th birthday. Her immediate cause of death was breast cancer that had returned and metastasized. However, her passing marked the end of a long and public 23-year health battle.

Somers was first diagnosed with stage 2 breast cancer in April 2000. At the time, she generated significant public discussion by opting for a lumpectomy and radiation therapy but declining to undergo chemotherapy. Instead, she became a prominent and sometimes controversial advocate for alternative treatments and bioidentical hormone replacement therapy, which she detailed in her many books. She had also battled other forms of cancer earlier in her life, including skin cancer in her 30s.

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