Jean Stapleton (born Jeanne Murray; January 19, 1923 – May 31, 2013) was an American character actress of stage, television and film. Stapleton is best known for her portrayal of Edith Bunker, the perpetually optimistic and devoted wife of Archie Bunker, on the 1970s sitcom All in the Family.[1] The role earned her three Emmys and two Golden Globes for Best Actress in a comedy series.
Early life
Stapleton was born on January 19, 1923[2] in Manhattan. She was the daughter of Marie A. Stapleton, an opera singer, and Joseph E. Murray, a billboard advertising salesman.[3] She had an elder brother, Jack.[2] Her uncle was a vaudevillian performer, and her brother was a stage actor who inspired her to pursue acting.[4]
Career
Stapleton began her career in 1942 aged 18 in summer stock theatre and made her New York debut in the Off-Broadway play American Gothic. She was featured on Broadway in several hit musicals, such as Funny Girl, Juno, Damn Yankees and Bells Are Ringing, recreating her parts from the latter two musicals in the film versions of Damn Yankees (1958) (her film debut) and Bells Are Ringing (1960).[5]
Stapleton bested both Mary Tyler Moore and Marlo Thomas for the "Best Actress in a Comedy" Primetime Emmy award on May 9, 1971. She was offered the role of Mrs. Teevee in the feature film Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory (1971), but declined because it coincided with the production of the All in the Family pilot (the role ultimately went to Nora Denney).[6]
Stapleton played the role of Edith in All in the Family, which premiered in 1971.[5] The show was originally broadcast on the CBS network for nine seasons from January 12, 1971, to April 8, 1979, for a total of 205 episodes. The role earned her three Emmys[7] and two Golden Globes.[8]
Feeling her character had run its course, Stapleton continued the role of Edith for only five more episodes in the follow-up series Archie Bunker's Place to help the transition, and then Edith was written out via stroke, offscreen, in the first episode of season two.[5]
Other works
Stapleton appeared in the Emmy Award–winning TV movie Tail Gunner Joe (1977), dramatizing the life of U.S. Senator Joseph R. McCarthy, and later guest-starred in the sixth episode of the third season of The Muppet Show (broadcast on September 30, 1978).
In 1979, she featured in the original Canadian production of the musical Something's Afoot, which was later broadcast on Showtime. She played the title role in the Hallmark Hall of Fame TV movie, Aunt Mary (also 1979), which detailed the true story of Baltimore children's advocate Mary Dobkin.[9] In 1982, Stapleton portrayed Eleanor Roosevelt in the TV movie Eleanor, First Lady of the World,[10] focusing on the subject's later life. The role earned her Emmy and Golden Globe nominations for Best Actress.
In 1996, Stapleton appeared in the educational series Beakman's World as Beakman's mother, Beakmom,[13] and also appeared on Everybody Loves Raymond playing Ray's imperious aunt.[14] The same year, she appeared in the Murphy Brown episode "All in the Family" playing Miles's grandmother, Nana Silverberg,[15] and also played opposite John Travolta in Nora Ephron's hit film Michael as the eccentric rooming house owner, Pansy Milbank.[5]
Making a debut in the world of video games, Stapleton was the voice of Grandma Ollie on KinderActive, Turner Pictures, and New Line Cinema's venture Grandma Ollie's Morphabet Soup. The game won a Teacher's Choice Award from Learning Magazine.
On January 26, 1998, Stapleton guest-starred on the Jean Smart sitcom Style & Substance in the episode "A Recipe for Disaster", playing a former television chef who has an alcohol problem.[16] She voiced John Rolfe's maid, Mrs. Jenkins, in Disney's 1998 direct-to-video animated film Pocahontas II: Journey to a New World,[17] and appeared in the film You've Got Mail as a close co-worker in whom Meg Ryan's character confides. From 1998, Stapleton took her "Eleanor" characterization to live theaters, now adapted as a one-woman show.[18]
In May 2000, Stapleton appeared in "Mother's Day", an episode of the TV series Touched by an Angel, portraying an angel named Emma who came to help Celine who was taking care of her late best friend's mother.
Stapleton's final film role was as Irene Silverman in the 2001 fact-based TV movie, Like Mother, Like Son: The Strange Story of Sante and Kenny Kimes, starring Mary Tyler Moore as convicted criminal Sante Kimes.[19] while her final acting role was in Horton Foote's The Carpetbaggers Children at Lincoln Center in NY., March 7th 2002.). [20]
Stapleton was married to William Putch from 1957 until his death in 1983. The couple had two children: actor/writer/director John Putch and television producer Pamela Putch.[23]
For 30 years, William Putch directed a summer stock theater, Totem Pole Playhouse, at Caledonia State Park in Fayetteville, Pennsylvania. Stapleton performed regularly at the theatre with the resident company. When William Putch died of a heart attack during the run of a production Stapleton had been appearing in at the playhouse, Stapleton insisted on performing that night.[24]
Stapleton rarely appeared on talk shows, but reunited on-camera with Carroll O'Connor on Donny and Marie Osmond's show on April 24, 2000, a little over a year before O'Connor's death. When the Osmonds asked her to perform in Edith Bunker's voice, she declined to do so, and jokingly told them that she only does so "for pay".[29]
Stapleton admitted that she seldom watched All in the Family, but by 2000 she reconsidered,[30] she told the Archive of American Television.[11]
Death and reaction
Stapleton died at her apartment in Manhattan, on May 31, 2013, at age 90.[3]
Norman Lear said, "No one gave more profound 'how to be a human being' lessons than Jean Stapleton."[31] Co-star Rob Reiner said, "Working with her was one of the greatest experiences of my life."[31]Sally Struthers said, "Jean lived so in the present. She was a Christian Scientist who didn't say or think a negative thing ... She was just a walking, living angel".[32]
The marquee lights on Broadway were dimmed for two minutes on June 5, 2013, at 8 p.m. EDT, to honor the memory of Stapleton.[33] She is buried at Lincoln Cemetery in Chambersburg, Pennsylvania.[34]
