Peggy Cass

Peggy Cass
Cass in 1973
Born
Mary Margaret Cass

(1924-05-21)May 21, 1924
DiedMarch 8, 1999(1999-03-08) (aged 74)
New York City, U.S.
Occupations
  • Actress
  • comedian
  • game show panelist
  • announcer
Years active1949–1997
Spouses
Carl Fisher
​
​
(m. 1948; div. 1965)​
Eugene Feeney
​
​
(m. 1979)​

Mary Margaret "Peggy" Cass (May 21, 1924 – March 8, 1999) was an American actress, comedian, game show panelist, and announcer.

As an actress, Cass is best known for originating the role of Agnes Gooch in the 1956 stage and 1958 film versions of Auntie Mame, for which she won a Tony Award and was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress. As a television personality, Cass is best known as one of the resident panelists on To Tell the Truth from 1962 to 1968 when hosted by Bud Collyer, 1969 to 1978 when hosted by Garry Moore and his successors Bill Cullen and Joe Garagiola, and 1990 when hosted by Gordon Elliott.

Early life

Peggy Cass received acting training at HB Studio[1] in New York City and eventually landed the lead role of Billie Dawn in a traveling production of Born Yesterday.[citation needed]

Stage and film

Cass made her Broadway debut in 1949 with the play Touch and Go. She portrayed Agnes Gooch in Auntie Mame on Broadway and in the film version (1958), a role for which she won the Tony Award for Best Supporting Actress, and received an Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actress.[2]

She was cast as "First Woman" in the nine-member ensemble of the 1960 Broadway revue A Thurber Carnival, adapted by James Thurber from his own works.[3] She played several characters throughout the performance, including: the mother in "The Wolf at the Door", the narrator of "The Little Girl and the Wolf", a nameless American tourist (who insisted Macbeth was a murder mystery), Miss Alma Winege in "File and Forget" (who wanted to ship to Mr. Thurber 36 copies of Grandma Was a Nudist, which he did not order), Mrs. Preble in "Mr. Preble Gets Rid of His Wife", Lou in "Take Her Up Tenderly" (who was helping to make old poetry more cheerful), and Walter Mitty's wife.[3]

In 1961, she played Mitzi Stewart in the movie Gidget Goes Hawaiian. In 1964, she starred as First Lady Martha Dinwiddie Butterfield in the mock-biographical novel First Lady: My Thirty Days in the White House. The book, written by Auntie Mame author Patrick Dennis, included photographs by Cris Alexander of Cass, Dody Goodman, Kaye Ballard and others who portrayed the novel's characters.[4]

In the late 1960s and early 1970s, Cass succeeded other actresses in Don't Drink the Water (as Marion Hollander) and in Neil Simon's Plaza Suite, and played Mollie Malloy in two revival runs of The Front Page. She also appeared in the 1969 film comedy If It's Tuesday, This Must Be Belgium. In the 1980s, she returned to the stage in 42nd Street and in the 1985 run of The Octette Bridge Club.[2]

Television and stage

One of Cass's earliest television roles was as Elinore Hathaway in The Hathaways, a 26-episode situation comedy that aired on ABC from October 6, 1961, to March 30, 1962.[citation needed] She starred with Jack Weston as suburban Los Angeles "parents" to a trio of performing chimpanzees. Weston portrayed Walter Hathaway, a real estate agent, and Cass was his zany wife, "mother" and booking agent for the Marquis Chimps, named Candy, Charlie and Enoch.[citation needed]

Peggy Cass (left) with James Thurber and Joan Anderson in A Thurber Carnival (1960)

Cass filled in as announcer on Jack Paar's late night talk show that aired in the 1970s on ABC.[citation needed]

In addition to her work with Paar, Cass's notable television work includes appearances on many game shows, on shows based mainly in New York City. She was a regular panelist on To Tell the Truth from 1960 through its 1990 revival, appearing in most episodes in the 1960s and 1970s.[5] She was also a panelist on the pilot of the 1960s version of Match Game.[citation needed]

On To Tell the Truth and other series, she often displayed near-encyclopedic knowledge of various topics and would occasionally question the logic of some of the "facts" presented on the program. Cass appeared on What's My Line? in 1963, and made several appearances on the $10,000 & $20,000 Pyramid hosted by Dick Clark from 1973 to 1980, as well as the nighttime version, which was titled The $25,000 Pyramid (1974–1979), hosted by her friend Bill Cullen. All three of these versions were taped in New York City. She also appeared in the late 1970s on Shoot for the Stars hosted by Geoff Edwards, which was another game show that partnered contestants with celebrities, also filmed in New York City.[citation needed]

In 1983, she appeared in the New Amsterdam Theatre Company's concert staging of Kurt Weill and Ogden Nash's One Touch of Venus as Mrs. Kramer, with Susan Lucci as her daughter, as well as Lee Roy Reams, Ron Raines, and Paige O'Hara as the titular Venus. In the spring of 1991, she participated in a concert staging of Cole Porter's Fifty Million Frenchmen at New York City's French Institute Alliance Française as Mrs. Gladys Carroll, singing Porter's "The Queen of Terre Haute".[6][7]

In 1987, Cass was featured in the early Fox sitcom Women in Prison. Aside from sitcoms, she played the role of H. Sweeney on the NBC afternoon soap opera The Doctors from 1978 to 1979.[citation needed]

Cass appeared on the pilot episode of Major Dad on September 17, 1989.[8] She portrayed Esther Nettleton, a civilian secretary working on the Marine base for Maj. John "Mac" MacGillis.

Personal life and death

On March 8, 1999, Cass died of heart failure in New York City at age 74 at the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center.[9]

Filmography

Year Title Role Notes
1952 The Marrying Kind Emily Bundy Uncredited
1958 Auntie Mame Agnes Gooch
1959 Alfred Hitchcock Presents Rhoda Motherwell Season 4 Episode 13: "Six People, No Music"
1961 Gidget Goes Hawaiian Mitzi Stewart
1969 If It's Tuesday, This Must Be Belgium Edna Ferguson
1969 Age of Consent His Wife
1970 Paddy Irenee

Stage

Year Title Role(s) Notes Ref.
1945 The Doughgirls performer [10]
1949 Touch and Go Moonbeam / Olivia / Second Sister Broadway debut [11]
1950 The Live Wire Liz Fargo [12]
1952 Bernardine Helen [13]
1956 Auntie Mame Agnes Gooch [14]
1960 A Thurber Carnival performer [15]
1963 Children From Their Games Vera von Stobel [16]
1968 Don't Drink the Water Marion Hollander [17]
1969 The Front Page Mollie Malloy [18]
1970 Plaza Suite Karen Nash / Muriel Tate / Norma Hubley [19]
1979 Once a Catholic Mother Basil [20]
1981 42nd Street Maggie Jones [21]
1983 Agnes of God Mother Miriam Ruth [22]
1985 The Octette Bridge Club Lil [23]

Awards and nominations

Awards
  • 1957 Tony Award, Best Featured Actress in a Play – Agnes Gooch in Auntie Mame
  • 1957 Theatre World Award – Agnes Gooch in Auntie Mame
Nominations

References

  1. ^ HB Studio Alumni, hbstudio.org. Accessed March 30, 2022.
  2. ^ a b Peggy Cass at the Internet Broadway Database
  3. ^ a b Thurber, James (1962). A Thurber Carnival. New York: Samuel French, Inc. OCLC 154260496.
  4. ^ Staff (August 7, 1964). "Also Current". Time. Archived from the original on October 13, 2007. Retrieved March 31, 2007.
  5. ^ Akers, Marshall (August 22, 2007). "To Tell the Truth". University of Georgia New Media Institute. Archived from the original on May 2, 2007. Retrieved May 28, 2007.
  6. ^ "Cole Porter / Fifty Million Frenchmen". www.sondheimguide.com. Retrieved March 4, 2022.
  7. ^ Fifty Million Frenchmen 1991 Studio Cast Import, Cast Recording (Audio CD). ASIN B0000030H8.
  8. ^ Pilot, Major Dad, retrieved March 4, 2022
  9. ^ Peggy Cass, 74, an Actress; Won Tony as Agnes Gooch, The New York Times; accessed October 11, 2016.
  10. ^ "Auntie Mame Tony-Winner, Peggy Cass, Dies at 74". Playbill. March 10, 1999. Retrieved May 1, 2022.
  11. ^ "Touch and Go – Broadway Musical – Original | IBDB". www.ibdb.com. Retrieved May 2, 2022.
  12. ^ "The Live Wire – Broadway Play – Original | IBDB". www.ibdb.com. Retrieved May 2, 2022.
  13. ^ "Bernardine – Broadway Play – Original | IBDB". www.ibdb.com. Retrieved May 2, 2022.
  14. ^ "Auntie Mame – Broadway Play – Original | IBDB". www.ibdb.com. Retrieved May 2, 2022.
  15. ^ "Peggy Cass in the stage production A Thurber Carnival". NYPL Digital Collections. Retrieved May 2, 2022.
  16. ^ "The Theater: Comedy by Irwin Shaw; 'Children From Their Games' at Morosco Martin Gabel Appears With Peggy Cass". timesmachine.nytimes.com. Retrieved May 2, 2022.
  17. ^ "Don't Drink the Water – Broadway Play – Original | IBDB". www.ibdb.com. Retrieved May 2, 2022.
  18. ^ "The Front Page – Broadway Play – 1969 Revival | IBDB". www.ibdb.com. Retrieved May 2, 2022.
  19. ^ Barnes, Clive (March 22, 1970). "The Theater: 'Plaza Suite' Revisited". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved May 2, 2022.
  20. ^ Kerr, Walter (October 11, 1979). "Stage: From Britain, 'Once a Catholic'". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved May 2, 2022.
  21. ^ "42nd Street – Broadway Musical – Original | IBDB". www.ibdb.com. Retrieved May 2, 2022.
  22. ^ "Agnes of God – Broadway Play – 1983-1984 Tour | IBDB". www.ibdb.com. Retrieved May 2, 2022.
  23. ^ Rich, Frank (March 6, 1985). "STAGE: FAMILY PORTRAIT, 'OCTETTE BRIDGE CLUB'". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved May 2, 2022.
Esther Nettleton
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