WAMG Tribute: Oscar-Winning Comedy Legend Cloris Leachman Has Died

By Jim Batts | January 28, 2021

Only a few days short of January’s end, 2021 has seen the loss of its first Oscar winner. Here’s how the Associated Press broke the news:

   Cloris Leachman, an Oscar-winner for her portrayal of a lonely housewife in “The Last Picture Show” and a comedic delight as the fearsome Frau Blücher in “Young Frankenstein” and self-absorbed neighbor Phyllis on “The Mary Tyler Moore Show,” has died. She was 94.

Leachman died in her sleep of natural causes at her home in Encinitas, California, publicist Monique Moss said Wednesday. Her daughter Dinah Englund was at her side, Moss said.

Remarkably those 94 years encompassed nine decades of work on the big and small(er) screen. A truly versatile actress, her knack for comedy wasn’t really showcased until nearly twenty years into her astounding career. As a tribute we offer a fond look back at the work of a true cinema “scene-stealer” who could effortlessly inspire laughter and tears.

First, we start with a few details on her showbiz roots. Cloris was born in Des Moines, IA on April 30, 1926. As teen growing up near the Windy City, she acted in plays before being crowned “Miss Chicago 1946” as part of the Miss America pageant. Soon she moved to NYC to study under famed director Elia Kazan at the prestigious Actors Studio. We first saw Cloris in the movies as an uncredited extra in 1947’s CARNEGIE HALL.

But TV audiences would soon know her name as the young actress kept very busy during those early days of live broadcasts. It wasn’t long before the movie studios beckoned her to the West Coast. For her first speaking film role, Cloris made an unforgettable cinema splash as she ran down a pitch black highway, barefoot (and supposedly five months pregnant), wearing a trench coat, prior to the opening titles of director Robert Aldrich’s adaptation of Mickey Spillane’s KISS ME DEADLY from 1955. Despite her character Christina’s hasty demise, Cloris certainly made a big impression in “Tinsel Town”.

Returning to TV for a year, she would be seen again on the big screen in THE RACK with Paul Newman (the first of three films with him, with small roles in BUTCH CASSIDY AND THE SUNDANCE KID and WUSA over a decade away). The small screen had more steady work for her as she became the second mom Ruth Martin to “Lassie”. After her single season stint ended, Cloris was in demand all over the TV landscape from Westerns, to police thrillers and even sitcoms. Some of her most memorable work was in the many anthology shows like “Alfred Hitchcock Presents”, “One Step Beyond”, “Thriller”, and, most memorably, in an iconic “The Twilight Zone” story as the exhausted mother of the all-powerful Anthony Freemont (Billy Mumy) in ”It’s a Good Life”.

Cloris was finally back on the big screen in 1962’s THE CHAPMAN REPORT,  seven years before BUTCH would start another film run with LOVERS AND OTHER STRANGERS, WUSA, THE PEOPLE NEXT DOOR, and THE STEAGLE. As she continued on more guest-starring roles on TV series (and made-for-TV-movies), a young “maverick” filmmaker would offer her the role that would change her life.

Peter Bogdanovich, fresh from his cult classic TARGETS, cast Cloris as the repressed lonely wife of the high school football coach, Ruth Popper, who begins a torrid affair with one of his students, in his adaptation of Larry McMurtry’s THE LAST PICTURE SHOW. The film was an unexpected box office smash which garnered lots of critical raves, especially for Leachman’s heartbreaking performance. And the Academy took notice bestowing eight nominations and awarding the coveted Supporting Actor and Actress Oscars to Ben Johnson and Cloris.

And just as Cloris finally made a name for herself in cinema, TV was also giving her career a huge boost with a character role in a truly “game-changing” situation comedy. Leachman was the abrasive Phyllis Lindstrom on “The Mary Tyler Moore Show” in 1970, a role that would earn her two Emmys and her own spin-off “Phyllis” from 1975 to 1977.  And as the world learned of her comedic gifts another big director tapped her for his latest romp.

Hot off the box office smash BLAZING SADDLES, Mel Brooks, along with star and co-writer Gene Wilder, would lovingly parody the black and white movie monster masterpieces of yore in 1974’s YOUNG FRANKENSTEIN. Leachman plays a pivotal supporting character, the mistress/housekeeper of the old Transylvanian castle Frau Blucher. The role was heavily influenced by Una O’Connor in THE BRIDE OF FRANKENSTEIN with touches of Judith Anderson as Mrs. Danvers in 1940’s REBECCA. Blucher herself inspired one of the film’s greatest “running gags”: whenever her name is spoken, a horse whinny is heard (causing her to grimace). The film was a huge hit and is often called the greatest horror/comedy/spoof of all time (as for yours truly, well, it’s my flat-out favorite flick ever).

But that’s not her last Brooks outing. Mel would call on her again for his Hitchcock-inspired comedy HIGH ANXIETY in 1977. This time Cloris was one of the villains, a sadistic shrew named Nurse Diesel who ran a shady sanitarium. Her forerunners were again Danvers, along with the controlling mom in NOTORIOUS and a touch of the Wicked Witch of the West. The final Brooks/Leachman collaboration would be in 1981’s THE HISTORY OF THE WORLD: PART 1 as she “dressed down” as Madam Defarge in the French Revolution segment.

Ms. Leachman would keep very busy over the next decades as she bounced from TV (she would headline several sitcoms and stepped into the hit “The Facts of Life” for its final two seasons) to the movies with a cameo in 1979’s THE MUPPET MOVIE (as Orson Wells’ secretary) and played Granny Moses in the 1993 big-screen version of the 60s TV classic THE BEVERLY HILLBILLIES. In between 70s comedies, Ms. Leachman was in a couple of 30s era crime thrillers. She led Public Enemy Number One to his doom as Anna Sage, the “woman in red”, in John Milius’ DILLINGER in 1973. Two years later she’d lead her own “crew” in Jonathan Demme’s CRAZY MAMA. She even revisited Ruth Popper in 1990’s TEXASVILLE (her third Bogdonavich film after co-starring in 1974’s DAISY MILLER). Cloris was soon in demand for grandmother roles with TV’s “Raising Hope” and in the BAD SANTA movies.

And she was also wanted at the “mike” for lots of animated projects. In TV Cloris lent her voice to everything from “The Simpsons” and Bob’s Burgers” to “Adventure Time” and “Justice League Action”. And at the movies she was heard in such cartoon features as BEAVIS AND BUTT-HEAD DO AMERICA, THE IRON GIANT, and MY LITTLE PONY: THE MOVIE. The last time we saw her on-screen credit was just a couple of months ago as she returned to her character “Gran” in the sequel to the 2013 hit, THE CROODS: A NEW AGE.

Hold on, we’ve not seen all of her work quite yet. Two feature films, NOT TO FORGET and HIGH HOLIDAY, will be completed soon (fingers crossed that the theatres will be ready). Ah, but for now we must say goodbye to one of our most prolific performances, though she’ll always be with us. Her Ruth Popper will forever touch our hearts as much as Frau Blucher (“whinny”) will tickle our funny bones as she screeches, “He vas’ my boyfriend!”. Just be careful that hot Ovaltine doesn’t shoot through your nose! Auf wiedersehen, Ms. Leachman!