Toukie Smith, the model and actress who played Eva Rawley on the NBC sitcom 227, died on November 4 at 74. Her children, Airyn and Julian De Niro, announced her death and said their mother had lived with multiple sclerosis. Their statement remembered her presence in their lives as well as her work in fashion and television.
Smith was born Doris Smith in Philadelphia in 1952. The name Toukie came from her grandmother, and it followed her from childhood into a career that took her from the runway to television. She studied at the Fashion Institute of Technology and began modeling in the early 1970s. Among the designers she worked with were Hubert de Givenchy, Issey Miyake, Thierry Mugler and Chanel. Bloomingdale’s recognized her as a favorite model in 1978.
A central figure in that part of her life was her brother, the designer Willi Smith. She modeled his clothes as he built WilliWear, a label associated with clothing made to be worn in ordinary life. The relaxed shapes and playful proportions made his clothes recognizable without making them precious. The siblings worked in different parts of the same industry, and her success on the runway helped make their shared contribution visible. Her children singled out the Smith family’s place in American fashion when they announced her death.
Smith’s shift to acting came in the 1980s. She appeared on Miami Vice and in the feature Me and Him before joining 227. The sitcom followed the people in a Washington apartment building, with Marla Gibbs as Mary Jenkins. Eva arrived in the fourth season. She was an artist who became the building’s manager and later worked at a gallery, a trajectory that gave Smith room to play someone with a professional life beyond the building. In a series built around neighbors who knew each other’s business, a new manager brought new relationships and disagreements into an established ensemble.
Her film credits went beyond that sitcom. Smith appeared in Talkin’ Dirty After Dark, I Like It Like That, Joe’s Apartment and The Preacher’s Wife. Those films took her from comedy to stories about families and relationships, and they kept her on screen through much of the 1990s. She also spent time in the food business. She ran a catering venture and later had a New York restaurant, Toukie’s, which directed some of its proceeds to the Smith Family Foundation. It was a separate line of work from modeling or acting and a part of her career that can be easy to miss when her name appears in television retrospectives.
Smith and Robert De Niro were together from 1988 to 1996 and welcomed their twins in 1995. Airyn also shared a tribute after the death announcement. The family photographs circulating this week show one period in Smith’s life, but the record of her work stretches much further. It includes the early runway years with her brother, the neighborhood comedy that brought her into American living rooms, and the projects she pursued after 227 ended.
Reporting on the family’s statement and Smith’s career is available from the Los Angeles Times.