Anne Meara Dead: Mother Of Ben Stiller

 

Anne Meara, Stiller and Meara & ' half ' mother of Ben Stiller, dies | Anne Meara Dead: Mother Of Ben Stiller

Comedy great Anne Meara, the witty half of the comedy team "Stiller & Meara," died at 85 on Saturday, her family said.

 

Meara and her husband, Jerry Stiller, were 61 years married and worked together almost as long, the family said in a statement. In addition to her husband, she is survived by her children, comic actor Ben Stiller, daughter Amy Stiller and grandchildren.  

 More detail read: Anne Meara Dead: Mother Of Ben Stiller

"Anne's memory lives on in the hearts of daughter Amy, son Ben, her grandchildren, her extended family and friends, and the millions that they entertained as a writer, an actress and comedian," said the family statement.

Meara was born in 1929 in Brooklyn, New York, to parents of Irish-Catholic descent. She studied with acting teacher Uta Hagen and to be pursued by a "serious" actor in the tradition of Maureen Stapleton and Kim Stanley. Anne Meara Dead

When she met Stiller, a Jewish boy from Brooklyn, and turned to comedy, although they "development target" comedians, she said in a 2005 interview.

"I was glad he got us to a comedy team, because then we were not ready for the agent to call," she said. "We travelled with our own stuff."  Mother Of Ben Stiller

The couple made their name as Quieter & Meara in the 1960s with frequent performances at various shows, including the "The Ed Sullivan Show." Desperate to come up with a bit at the last minute, they plumbed the depths of their background "Uber-Jewish man" Hershey Horowitz and "Uber-Irish girl" Mary Elizabeth Doyle--caricatures of himself, they said in 2005.

The couple met at a New York casting call in 1953. Meara left crying, saying the agent chased her around the Office, a scene described in Quieter the autobiography, "married to laughter: a love story Featuring Anne Meara."

Anne Meara Dead: Mother Of Ben Stiller http://sowginews.blogspot.com | "They looked kind of Puritan and non-beautiful," Stiller said of the "angel-faced" aspiring actress. When he invited her out for coffee, he was caught off-guard when she asked him to steal from silverware to pay in Exchange for its share.

"I said to myself, ' what I get myself in, hanging out with New York actresses? They are all crazy, ' "he wrote.

They married in 1954, and she converted to Judaism, according to The Hollywood Reporter. After years of struggling to fame, they eventually teamed up for an act of the comedy play exaggerated versions of themselves in New York's Greenwich Village coffee houses: self-mockery, kvetching New Yorkers.

Anne Meara Dead: Mother Of Ben Stiller http://sowginews.blogspot.com  They occur in Chicago's compass Theatre, a 1950s cabaret revue Show whose members form the second City Theater in 1959 went polished. Before long, they were performing as Quieter & Meara on popular TV shows from the 1960s, including "The Merv Griffin Show," "The Ed Sullivan Show" and "The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson."

Their success led to a contract for Blue Nun wine radio commercials, a long-lasting campaign credited with boosting sales of the semi-sweet German wine.

By the 1970s they were ready independent career or risk ending carry their marriage.

"I didn't know where the law ended and our marriage began," Meara told people magazine in 1977.

"I love Anne, but if I had been depending on her in my professional life ... I would have lost her as a woman, "Stiller told the magazine.

Quieter pursued a career in comedy that led to memorable role as the father of George Costanza on "Seinfield" and "The King of Queens."

Meara became a regular on the game show circuit and the role of Sally Gallagher landed on the TV series "Rhoda." She joined play hundreds of TV roles in the 1980s and 1990s in virtually every hit show of the moment, from "The Love Boat" to "ALF" to "Sex and the City" and "King of Queens."

News of her death prompted tributes from fans and celebrities spanning generations.

"My heart and prayers go out to Jerry and Am for the loss of their beloved Anne Meara," actress Patty Duke said.

 

Anne Meara, the spray-N-pray, sweet comedian who launched a standup career with husband Jerry Stiller in the 1950s and found success as an actress in movies, on TV and the stage, has died.

Jerry Stiller and son Ben Stiller say that Meara died Saturday. No other details were provided.

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The Quieter family released a statement to The Associated Press on Sunday with a description of Jerry Stiller and Meara from "man and partner in life."

"The two were married 61 years and have worked together almost as long," said the statement.

Born in Brooklyn on september 20, 1929, and grew up in Rockville Centre where they went to high school, she was a redhead, Irish-Catholic girl who beat a lively contrast to quieter, a Jewish man to Manhattan's Lower East Side who was two years older and four inches shorter.

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As Stiller and Meara she appeared in comedy routines that jokes about married life and their respective ethnic backgrounds. They signed 36 appearances on "The Ed Sullivan Show" and were a successful team in Las Vegas, large nightclubs, on records and in commercials (scoring big for Blue Nun wine with their sketches on radio).

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They were New Yorkers, known for their beloved neighbors Upper West Side. The marriage lasted, but the act was dissolved in the 1970s as Meara resumed the acting career that they had originally wanted. She has appeared in movies like "The Out-of-Towners," ' ' fame, "' ' Awakenings" and directed by her son, "Reality Bites."

Meara was twice nominated for an Emmy Award for her supporting role on "Archie bunker's Place," along with two other Emmy nods, most recently in 1997 for her guest-starring role on "Homicide: life on the street." She won a Writers Guild Award for cowriting the 1983 TV movie "the other woman."

She also appeared in numerous films and TV shows, including a long time role on "All My Children" and appearances on "Rhoda," "" Alf "and" The King of Queens. " She shared the screen with her son in 2006 's "Night at the Museum."

Meara also had a recurring role on CBS ' "Murphy Brown" and on HBO's "Sex and the City." In 1975 she starred in CBS ' "Kate McShane," which, though short-lived, had the distinction of being the first network drama to feature a woman lawyer.

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She made her off-Broadway debut in 1971 in John Guare's award-winning play "The House of Blue Leaves." A quarter of a century later, she made her off-Broadway bow as a playwright with her comedy-drama, "After Play."

Meara was an aspiring 23-year-old actress in 1953 that they responded to a "cattle call" by an agent of the New York casting for summer stock. After the agent chased her around his Office, she burst in the waiting room, crying and out of breath, where they more quietly, an out-of-work actor than 25 found.

"I found her out for coffee," recalled Quieter decades later for The Associated Press. "They seemed to feel that I had no money, so they just ordered coffee. Then she took the silverware. I picked up her check box for 10 cents and thought, "this is a girl that I want to hang out with." "

Within a few months, they were wed.

But this was a mixed marriage, and refers to their respective families, Meara said: "no one, absolutely no one was so happy when we got married." But they accepted, she added with perfect comic timing, "nobody was sitting shiva."
Anne Meara Dead http://sowginews.blogspot.com

Despite her theater background was Meara, with her bright eyes and cheeky smile, a quick study as a comedian when she and quieter running in improv groups. Her ability to adapt was all the more remarkable since, back then, "I was down on comedians. Growing up, I loved drama and fantasies. I hated the Marx Brothers. I already have that confusion taken seriously. "

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The couple had an old-fashioned job not unlike that of Burns and Allen, but Stiller and Meara were thick in the 1950s Beat Generation, an edgy, innovative arts scene set in New York's Greenwich Village, where she had an apartment. "But WE thought that when the village really happened in the 1920s, the days of f. Scott Fitzgerald, before our time was," she said. "People never know what's going on, while it happens. You think, during the Renaissance, people called it ' The Renaissance '? "

The law of the husband-and-wife was born out of desperation shortly after the birth of their first child, Amy, in 1961. There was insufficient work in legitimate theater, and improv was not the accounts bet
Anne Meara Dead: Mother Of Ben Stiller http://sowginews.blogspot.com