Carole Shelley

At 79 years old, Carole Shelley has this physical status:

Carole Augusta Shelley (16 August 1939 – 31 August 2018) was a British-American actress who spent her life in the United States.

Madame Morrible played Madame Morrible in the original Broadway cast of the musical Wicked, among her many stage appearances.

She received the Tony Award for Best Actress in a Play for her appearance in The Elephant Man in 1979.

Early life

Shelley was born in London, England, and the niece of Deborah (née Bloomstein), an opera singer of Russian Jewish descent, and Curtis Shelley, a German Jewish composer, was born. Before World War II, her father had immigrated to London.

Personal life

She married Albert G. Woods, who died in 1971, in 1967.

Shelley died of cancer at the age of 79 in New York City on August 31, 2018.

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Career

Shelley made her Broadway debut as Gwendolyn Pigeon in the original 1965 revival of The Odd Couple (starring Art Carney and Walter Matthau). She reprised her role in the 1968 film version (with Jack Lemmon replacing Carney) and the first season of the subsequent television series (starring Tony Randall and Jack Klugman). She and Monica Evans, who costarred as her sister Cecily Pigeon, were the only two actors to appear in the original play The Odd Couple and the original television version—and in the same role.

Shelley wanted to stretch her reach in the 1970s because she wasn't using any of her skills as an actor. In a 1979 interview with The New York Times, she said she had "months of intense deep-water swimming, more than I'd ever been asked to do in my life" when she appeared in As You Like It at the 1972 Stratford Festival in Ontario. In 1975, she received her first Tony Award nomination for her role as "Jane" in Absurd Person Singular. Shelley was nominated for the Tony Award in 1979 for her role as Mrs. Kendal in The Elephant Man, and she was nominated for the Tony Award as the Best Actress in a Play for her role as "Maxine" in a Play. In 1982, she received the Obie Award for her appearance Twelve Dreams. Shelley first appeared in musicals in the 1990s, when Show Boat's revivals as Parthy and Cabaret as Fraulein Schneider in 1999.

Shelley originated Madame Morrible in the original Broadway cast of The musical Wicked in 2003, a role she reprised in the show's national touring company in 2005 and 2006.

Shelley appeared as Grandma in Billy Elliot's Broadway revival, which opened in October 2008. In 2009, she was nominated for a Tony Award for Best Featured Actress in a Musical. Miss Shingle was Jane Carr's successor in A Gentleman's Guide to Love and Murder, 2014.

Shelley's early career included appearances in British films such as It's Great to Be Young (1956), Carry On Regardless (1961), No My Darling Daughter (1961), and Carry On Cabby (1963). Shelley appeared in The Odd Couple (1968) as Gwendolyn Pigeon. Following that, she appeared in television and film including "Some Kind of a Nut (1969), The Whoopee Boys (1986), Little Noises (1992), The Road to Wellville (1994), and she appeared in the Emmy Award-winning 1998 Frasier film "Merry Christmas, Mrs. Moskowitz."

In the 2005 film Bewitched, she appeared as "Aunt Clara" alongside Nicole Kidman and former Wicked co-star Kristin Chenoweth. In Robin Hood (1973), Lady Kluck, Maid Marian's sidekick and lady-in-waiting, and Lachesis the Fate in Hercules, she lent her voice to several roles in Disney animated films, including Amelia Gabble (the Goose). Monica Evans, Shelley's "sister" in all three versions of The Odd Couple, also appeared in The Aristocats, Abigail Gabble, and Maid Marian in Robin Hood as a nod to their roles as Pigeon Sisters.

She appeared in Kid Gorgeous, John Mulaney's 2018 comedy special Kid Gorgeous, and she was a cameo; she was a tour guide to Radio City Music Hall.

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