Anne Meara
Anne Meara (born September 20, 1929) is an American comedian and actress. She was born in New York City, into a family of Irish Catholic extraction and raised accordingly. She and Jerry Stiller are the parents of actor/comedian Ben and actress Amy Stiller.
Her mother committed suicide when Meara was 11, and she has been in therapy since the mid-1980s. She was raised Catholic, but converted to Judaism six years after marrying Stiller. She has long stressed that her conversion was not at Stiller's request, but because "Catholicism was dead to me," and she simply came to prefer the more "lively" character of Jewish culture. She took the conversion seriously, studying the faith in such depth that her born-Jewish husband quipped, "being married to Anne has made me more Jewish."
Meara has been married to Stiller since 1954. Both were members of the improvisational company The Compass Players (which would later become The Second City), and the pair, as the comedy team Stiller and Meara, brought many of their real-life relationship foibles to bear on their often-improvised comedy routines. After some years honing the act, Stiller and Meara became regulars on The Ed Sullivan Show and other TV programs.
Meara co-starred along side Carroll O'Connor and Martin Balsam in early 1980s hit sit-com Archie Bunker's Place, which was a continuation of the influential 1970s sitcom All in the Family. She played the role of Veronica Rooney, who was the Bar’s cook, for the show's first three seasons (1979-1982). She also appeared as the grandmother in the TV series ALF in the late 1980s. More recently, she has had recurring roles on the television shows Sex and the City (as Mary Brady) and The King of Queens (as Veronica). In the 2004-05 season she was on an episode of Law and Order SVU.
Filmography
- The Out-of-Towners (1970)
- Lovers and Other Strangers (1970)
- Irish Whiskey Rebellion (1972)
- Nasty Habits (1977)
- The Boys from Brazil (1978)
- Fame (1980)
- In Our Hands (1984) (documentary)
- The Longshot (1986)
- The Perils of P.K. (1986)
- My Little Girl (1987)
- That's Adequate (1989)
- Awakenings (1990)
- Through an Open Window (1992) (short subject)
- Highway to Hell (1992)
- So You Want to Be an Actor (1993) (short subject)
- Reality Bites (1994)
- The Search for One-Eye Jimmy (1994)
- Heavyweights (1995)
- Kiss of Death (1995)
- The Daytrippers (1996)
- The Thin Pink Line (1998)
- Southie (1998)
- The Diary of the Hurdy-Gurdy Man (1999)
- Judy Berlin (1999)
- Brooklyn Thrill Killers (1999) (short subject)
- A Fish in the Bathtub (1999)
- Amy Stiller's Breast (2000) (short subject)
- The Independent (2000)
- Zoolander (2001)
- Keeping It Real: The Adventures of Greg Walloch (2001) (documentary)
- Get Well Soon (2001)
- Like Mike (2002)
- The Yard Sale (2002) (short subject)
- Crooked Lines (2003)
- Chump Change (2004)
Upcoming
Television Work
- The Greatest Gift (1954-1955)
- Ninotchka (1960)
- Dames at Sea (1971)
- The Paul Lynde Show (1972-1973)
- The Corner Bar (cast member in 1973)
- Kate McShane (1975) (canceled after 10 episodes)
- Rhoda (cast member from 1976-1977)
- Archie Bunker's Place (cast member from 1979-1982)
- The Other Woman (1983)
- The Stiller & Meara Show (1986) (canceled after a few weeks)
- The Day They Came to Arrest the Book (1987)
- Avenue Z Afternoon (1991)
- The Sunset Gang (1991)
- All My Children (cast member from 1992-1999)
- Love Off Limits (1993)
- The Mother (1994)
- Jitters (1997)
- What Makes a Family (2001)
- Sex and the City (2002-2004)