The Tragic Real-Life Story Of Cass Elliot

Of all of the members of the legendary singing group, The Mamas and the Papas, Cass Elliot clearly stood out. What with her clear, distinctive singing voice, she brought out the best in the band. Little did anyone know that Elliot, born Ellen Naomi Cohen in 1941 in Maryland, would take the music world by storm. U Discover Music tells how Elliot got her nickname in high school and quickly cast her acting aspirations aside to follow her love for singing. By the early 1960s, she had been in some bands, including Triumvirate and the Mugwumps, before escalating to fame with the Mamas and the Papas.

According to Rolling Stone, Cass Elliot quickly became "the queen of LA pop society." She partied with the best musicians, and came off as lighthearted and carefree on stage. Posthumously, she was honored when the Mamas and the Papas were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1998. In real life, however, Biography says Cass Elliot's life was fraught with heartbreak, the trials of being a single mother, her weight, and even a brush with the notorious Manson Family. For Elliot, fame came at a cost, right up to her early death in 1974. Read on for the tragic real-life story of Cass Elliot.

Cass Elliot was playing with the Mugwumps when she met fellow musician Denny Doherty, who introduced her to John and Michelle Phillips, writes U Discover Music. The threesome was forming a band, and Elliot wanted to join the group. Besides, she was attracted to Doherty, but he "couldn't deal with the weight," according to The Atlantic. Neither could the band. Nobody could picture Cass Elliot performing next to the gorgeous Michelle Phillips. John Phillips especially believed Elliot's size would be a turnoff to their fans, says Biography. But Elliot remained determined to join the band and dedicated herself to following them wherever they went.

According to Rolling Stone, Michelle remembered how Elliot began "following us around. Everywhere we went. It got to be a sadomasochistic game." Elliot was willing to do anything, from waitressing at the nightclub where they were playing to rehearsing with them while they were on break. Then, Michelle said, "we'd say, 'OK, Cass, serve some f****** drinks, we're going onstage.'" When the group was kicked out of St. Thomas for drugging, says the Baltimore Sun, they wound up with no money and showed up at Elliot's Los Angeles home. Only then was she allowed to join the band.

Despite hit songs like "California Dreamin'" and "Monday Monday" (which earned them a Grammy Award in 1967), the Mamas and the Papas were typical musicians of the time. "The first acid trip any of us ever took, we took together," John Phillips would later tell Rolling Stone. It wouldn't be the last time; Michelle Phillips would remember that when they were in the Virgin Islands, the group had "limited their drug use to psychedelics and alcohol," according to the Baltimore Sun, but "there was no cocaine around. Thank God. We would have gotten nothing done." As The Atlantic notes, "Before they hit the big time, the group dropped acid, smoked dope, and drank. After they hit the big time, the group dropped acid, smoked dope, and drank."

Then there were heartbreaks, starting with Michelle messing around with Denny Doherty, according to Musicoholics. That obviously did not sit well with Cass Elliot, who confronted Michelle. "You can have any man in the world," she told Michelle. "Why take the one man I love?" Yet somehow, Cass was able to forgive her bandmate. Michelle would also eventually have affairs with Gene Clark of The Byrds, as well as many of John's friends, according to Vanity Fair.

According to the Cass Elliot website, the singer wed twice between 1963 and 1971. Her first husband was Jim Hendricks; Ancestry verifies the couple was united in marriage at Fairfax, Virginia. By 1967 the couple had split, according to Courthouse News, when Cass gave birth to her only child, a daughter named Owen (pictured, with Michelle Phillips). At the time, unwed mothers were highly frowned upon. So Cass kept both her pregnancy and the name of Owen's father a secret, says Next Tribe. "She wanted me more than anything else in the world — she told people that," Owen told the magazine.

Why did Cass Elliot remain so secretive about her daughter? "She named me Owen because I was her 'own,'" Owen says. "She was responsible for one hundred percent of my welfare." She also remained as close to her daughter as she could, and was uneasy when Owen grew too close to her nannies. After Cass died, Vanity Fair confirms that her sister, Leah Kunkel, continued raising Owen. But it was Michelle Phillips who found Owen's father. In 1987, according to Encyclopedia, Michelle called Owen. "I found your dad," she said. "Here's a plane ticket. Go meet him." Not surprisingly, Owen's father was indeed Jim Hendricks.

In 1969, Charles Manson and his followers notoriously murdered actress Sharon Tate and others in Los Angeles. It was soon revealed that Manson's party circuit had previously included Cass Elliot's home. According to Biography, Manson was at least at one of the celebrity soirees Elliot became known for. And Manson's bus was also frequently seen parked at John and Michelle Phillips' house, according to The Brag. Tate, says Rolling Stone, was friends with Elliot and Michelle. And, alludes The Atlantic, Denny Doherty was supposed to go to Tate's house that night but didn't make it.

Interestingly, although Michelle once slept with Tate's husband, Roman Polanski, it was Cass Elliot whom John Phillips blamed for the mess. In his book about Sharon Tate, Ed Sanders quoted Elliot as saying, "John blamed me for bringing killers into our group, blamed me for Sharon's death, and said police were going to arrest me as an accomplice." He also convinced her that she would be murdered next. 

Naturally, the police got wind of all of this during their investigation, and in 1970 the San Antonio Express reported that both Cass Elliot and John Phillips were being subpoenaed to testify – in Manson's defense. Fortunately, however, they never appear to have been summoned.

According to Encyclopedia, Cass Elliot once said of her weight, "I simply learned that's the way I am and so I live with it." But as early as 1969, her article for The Ladies Home Journal (per Hillstock) revealed the star had once embarked on a crash diet that gave her "acute tonsillitis, hemorrhaging vocal cords, mononucleosis and a dangerous case of hepatitis." Her illnesses, she said, cost her over $250,000 in lost earnings. The Guardian explains Elliot had plunged into a diet of fasting for four days a week, which lasted seven months.

As her struggles continued, Cass Elliot grappled with something else, too: the infamous "Mama Cass" nickname she had earned with The Mamas and The Papas. Her 1973 appearance on "The Johnny Carson Show" announced that Cass's first television special and her next album both bore the same title: "Don't Call Me Mama Anymore." Elliot was indeed continuing to diet, to the extent that just before another appearance on Johnny Carson, she passed out backstage. During another appearance, on "The Mike Douglas Show," Cass explained that she had not eaten all day prior to "The Johnny Carson Show" – and was then coerced into talking about her love for Tastykake cupcakes.

If you are struggling with an eating disorder, or know someone who is, help is available. Visit the National Eating Disorders Association website or contact NEDA's Live Helpline at 1-800-931-2237. You can also receive 24/7 Crisis Support via text (send NEDA to 741-741).

As Cass Elliot was laid to rest in California, the rumors about the cause of her death continued as the story unfolded. According to U Discover Music, Elliot had just finished a two-week stint at the London Palladium. On Sunday, July 28, Rolling Stone reported she went to a party hosted by Mick Jagger but did not drink anything. She left early. The apartment she was staying in was owned by fellow singer Harry Nilsson. Also staying there was Elliot's road manager, George Caldwell. And although several people had been in and out of the apartment during the day of July 29, they all presumed that Elliot was just sleeping.

Sue Cameron, then a reporter for The Hollywood Reporter, told People magazine that she called Elliot's apartment upon hearing news of her death. The phone was answered by the singer's manager, Allan Carr, who frantically instructed Cameron to write that Elliot died by choking on the ham sandwich sitting on the nightstand. In truth, writes Vogue magazine's Emma Specter, the official autopsy report revealed several weeks later that Elliot had actually died from "fatty myocardial degeneration due to obesity." Carr, however, thanked Cameron for writing the story regarding the sandwich. "I was trying to save her reputation," he said.