1. Alice Margaret Ghostley was an American actress and singer on stage, film and television.
27 Facts About Alice Ghostley
1. 2.
Alice Margaret Ghostley was born on August 14,1923 at a train station in Eve, Missouri, to Edna Muriel and Harry Francis Ghostley, who worked as a telegraph operator.
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Alice Ghostley attended the University of Oklahoma, but dropped out to pursue a career in theater.
4.
Alice Ghostley first came to Broadway in Leonard Sillman's New Faces of 1952 and in the film version released in 1954.
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Alice Ghostley's featured number was "The Boston Beguine", a comic song about finding romance and danger in the very proper Boston, Massachusetts.
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Alice Ghostley recorded her vocal for an RCA Victor 45-rpm single; the other side was New Faces co-star Eartha Kitt singing "Monotonous".
7.
Alice Ghostley established herself as a plain-looking, sad-smiling comedienne in early television.
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Alice Ghostley appeared as Joy, one of the ugly stepsisters in the 1957 musical television production of Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein's Cinderella, which starred Julie Andrews in the title role.
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Twelve years later, Alice Ghostley guest-starred as a harried maternity nurse on Ballard's comedy series, The Mothers-in-Law.
10.
Alice Ghostley appeared in two 1961 episodes of The Tom Ewell Show.
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Alice Ghostley was a favorite of Jackie Gleason, who featured her in his "American Scene Magazine" variety hours of the 1960s.
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Alice Ghostley portrayed recurring characters on several situation comedies, beginning with Bewitched in 1966 in "Maid to Order", in which Ghostley played an inept maid named Naomi, who was hired by Darrin Stephens to assist his wife Samantha during her pregnancy.
13.
The producers of the series immediately offered the role of Gladys to Alice Ghostley, who refused it.
14.
In September 1969, after the death of actress Marion Lorne, who played Aunt Clara, Alice Ghostley joined Bewitched as a semiregular in the role of Esmeralda, a shy witch who served as a maid and babysitter to the Stephens' household.
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Alice Ghostley's Esmeralda appeared in 15 episodes of Bewitched between 1969 and 1972.
16.
Between 1986 and 1993, Alice Ghostley portrayed Bernice Clifton, the slightly off-kilter, eccentric friend of Julia and Suzanne Sugarbaker's mother, Perky, on Designing Women.
17.
Alice Ghostley later played Irna Wallingsford in six episodes of Evening Shade.
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Alice Ghostley had a recurring role of Ida Mae Brindle in the sitcom Small Wonder, which ran from 1985 to 1989.
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Alice Ghostley made a one-time appearance as Great-Grandma in Sabrina the Teenage Witch.
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Alice Ghostley made a few guest appearances on the daytime drama Passions in 2000, playing the ghost of Matilda Matthews.
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Alice Ghostley starred in Gator as Gator's partner in crime who brings her cats along on a burglary.
22.
Alice Ghostley appeared in the film version of Grease as shop teacher Mrs Murdock.
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Alice Ghostley played Grandmama in the direct-to-video movie Addams Family Reunion.
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Alice Ghostley received a Tony nomination in 1963 for different roles she played in the Broadway comedy The Beauty Part.
25.
Alice Ghostley received a Tony Award for Best Featured Actress for her role in The Sign in Sidney Brustein's Window.
26.
Alice Ghostley was married to Felice Orlandi, an Italian-American actor, from 1953 until his death in 2003.
27.
Alice Ghostley died at her home in Studio City, California, on September 21,2007, of colon cancer and a series of strokes.