Most Recent Role: Matilda Matthews on Passions
Alias Name(s): Alicia Ghostley---- Alice Ghostly
Gender: Female
Birthplace: Eve, Missouri, USA
Birthday: 8-14-1926
Birth Name: Alicia Margaret Ghostley
Date of Death: 9-21-2007
Cause of Death: Colon cancer and a series of strokes (Studio City, California, USA)
Alias Name(s): Alicia Ghostley---- Alice Ghostly
Gender: Female
Birthplace: Eve, Missouri, USA
Birthday: 8-14-1926
Birth Name: Alicia Margaret Ghostley
Date of Death: 9-21-2007
Cause of Death: Colon cancer and a series of strokes (Studio City, California, USA)
While essentially a comedic actress best known to her television audience as the shy, anxiety-ridden, supernatural housekeeper on the ABC sitcom, Bewitched , and as the batty Bernice Clifton (a role which earned her an Emmy nomination in 1992) on CBS’ comedy series, Designing Women , Alice Ghostley was also an accomplished singer and Broadway performer who won a Tony Award as Best Featured...
Most Recent Appearance
Ep. #147
Thursday 27 January 2000 on Other
Episode summary coming soon.
Alice, at the start of her entertainment career, use to do a lot of backers' auditions, where actors would do portions of shows to try and raise money for the production. It was while doing such an audition that she met composer G. Wood, who convinced her to join him in a nightclub act that they premiered at the Bon Soir club in New York City.
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Alice played Mrs. Murdock, the auto mechanics teacher, in the film version of Grease (1978), a role which she found quite ironic since she didn't drive.
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Alice listed her year of birth as 1926, but many sources dispute the date, including comedic actress and longtime friend, Kaye Ballard, who claims Ghostley was actually about two years older.
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Alice’s last public performance as an actress occurred in 2004 on the PBS program, Great Performances, also on which aired the 1957 televised Rodgers and Hammerstein comedy musical, Cinderella, in which she was cast as Stepsister, Joy.
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Alice had a major showcase when she debuted at the fabled Bon Soir, a basement café run by the Mafia in Greenwich Village (New York City, New York)and known for its liberal atmosphere (both black and white were welcomed, and one half of the club featured a gay bar). Ghostley and friend/fellow comedian, Kaye Ballard, performed outlandish depictions including a portrayal of Mona Lisa as an Italian prostitute whose advances Leonardo da Vinci snubs when he only wants to paint her picture.
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Alice: (about being a ham) I have to be.
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Alice: When I was five years old, my mother took me to the Legion Hut and stood me on a table. I recited poetry! I sang songs! I tapped danced! I didn’t know it then, but that table was my first stage. There was applause. The second time my mother took me to the Hut, I made her give me a nickel before I stood on the table. I wanted the applause, but even at five, I knew I had earned the applause.
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Alice: When I first started out, I had this natural ability to sing. That was another reason why I chose New York, with all the musicals that were happening at the time. But I looked so different from everyone else. I was never what you would call an ingenue. I was having difficulty finding jobs. ‘Get your eyes straightened,’ they would tell me, ‘and maybe we can work with you.'
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Alice: I’m really happiest when I’m working.
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Alice: (finding it difficult to watch herself on the ABC sitcom, ‘Bewitched’) It’s always hard for me to critique myself.
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Other Appearances
| Star | |
|---|---|
|
Bewitched
Esmerelda |
Captain Nice
Carter's Mother |
|
Channel Umptee-3
voice of Pandora Rickets |
Jackie Gleason and His American Scene Magazine
Regular (1962-1964) |
|
Mayberry R.F.D.
Alice Cooper |
Nichols
Bertha, Saloon Keeper |
| Recurring Role | |
|---|---|
|
Bewitched
Esmerelda |
Designing Women
Bernice Clifton |
|
Evening Shade
Irna Wallingsford |
Love, American Style |
|
Passions
Matilda Matthews |
The Jonathan Winters Show
Herself (1968-1969) |
| Guest Star | |
|---|---|
|
All's Fair
Living Together Inez |
America 2Night
Tony Rolletti Herself |
|
B.L. Stryker
Night Train Unknown |
Bewitched
Maid to Order Naomi |
|
Big Eddie
Crashing Violet Violet Klabber |
Car 54, Where are You?
Christmas at the 53rd Bonita Kalsheim |
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SparkleFarkleScore: 142 points |
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