Everything about Mary Tyler Moore totally explained
Mary Tyler Moore (born
December 29,
1936) is an
Academy Award-nominated and seven-time
Emmy Award winning
American actress and
comedian, primarily known for her roles in
sitcoms and television.
Moore is arguably best known for
The Mary Tyler Moore Show (1970–1977), in which she starred as
Mary Richards, a 30-something single woman who worked as a news producer at WJM-TV in
Minneapolis, and for her early role as Laura Petrie, wife of television comedy writer Rob Petrie (played by
Dick Van Dyke) on
The Dick Van Dyke Show (1961–1966). Moore played leading roles in two of the most fondly remembered classic comedy series, making a tremendous impact on television over two decades.
She has also appeared in various films over the years. Her best-remembered performance came in 1980's
Ordinary People, which garnered her an
Oscar nomination for a role that was the polar opposite of the characters viewers had become accustomed to seeing her portray on television. She has also been active in charity work and various political causes, particularly
diabetes and
animal rights.
Biography
Early life
The eldest of three siblings, Moore was born in 1936 in the
Brooklyn Heights section of
Brooklyn, New York to George Tyler Moore and Marjorie Hackett. She moved to
California when she was eight years old. She attended
Saint Rose of Lima Roman Catholic school in
Brooklyn;
St. Ambrose School Los Angeles on Fairfax; and the exclusive
Immaculate Heart High School on Los Feliz Boulevard in
Hollywood, California.
Career
Television
At the age of 17, Moore started with a role as "Happy Hotpoint" on
television commercials broadcast during
Ozzie and Harriet. During these commercials she'd dance around on the
Hotpoint (a
General Electric subsidiary) appliances. (Her time as "Happy Hotpoint" ended when her pregnancy, with her only child Richard, became too obvious for her to hide any longer, according to Moore in her autobiography.)
She later appeared in several bit parts in movies and on TV shows, including
Bourbon Street Beat,
77 Sunset Strip,
Surfside Six,,
Steve Canyon,
Hawaiian Eye and
Lock Up in 1961 where a woman named Laura helped save her from prison. Moore anonymously modelled on the covers of a number of record albums and auditioned for the role of the older daughter of
Danny Thomas for his long-running hit TV show, but was turned down. Much later, Thomas explained that "no daughter of mine could have that [little] nose." Moore's first regular television role was as a telephone receptionist on the show
Richard Diamond, Private Detective; in that series, only her
legs were shown and voice heard.
In 1961,
Carl Reiner cast her in
The Dick Van Dyke Show, an acclaimed weekly series based on Reiner's own life and career as a writer for
Sid Caesar's television variety show, telling the cast from the outset that it would run no more than five years. The show was produced by Danny Thomas's company, and Thomas himself recommended her. He remembered Mary as "the girl with three names" whom he'd turned down earlier. Moore's energetic comedic performances as Van Dyke's character's wife, begun at age 24 (hence she was 11 years Van Dyke's junior), made both the actress and her signature tight capri pants extremely popular, and she became nationally famous. When she won an
Emmy award for her portrayal of Laura Petrie, she said, through her tears, quite incorrectly, "I know this will never happen again!"
In 1970, after having appeared earlier in a pivotal one-hour musical special called "Dick Van Dyke and the Other Woman", Moore was cast in
The Mary Tyler Moore Show, a half-hour newsroom
sitcom featuring
Ed Asner as her gruff boss
Lou Grant, a character that would later be spun off into an hour-long dramatic series. The premise of the single working woman's life, alternating during the program between work and home, became a television staple that would often be used in the future. After six years of high ratings in the top 20, the show slipped to number #39 during its seventh season. Producers argued for its cancellation due to its falling ratings, afraid that the show's legacy might be damaged if it were renewed for another season. This was to the surprise of the entire cast including Mary Tyler Moore herself when they were all told they'd soon be filming their final episode. After the announcement, the series finished strongly and the final show was by far the most watched show during the week it aired. The series had become a touchpoint of the
Women's Movement because it was one of the first to show, in a serious way, an independent working woman.
After a brief respite, Moore threw herself into a completely different genre. She attempted two failed variety series in a row:
Mary, which featured
David Letterman and
Michael Keaton in the supporting cast and lasted three episodes, and
The Mary Tyler Moore Hour, which was canceled within three months.
About this time, she also made a one-off musical/variety special for CBS, titled "
Mary's Incredible Dream", which featured
John Ritter, among others. It did poorly in the ratings and, according to Moore, was never repeated and will likely never see the light of day again because of legal problems surrounding the show.
In the 1985-86 season, she returned to CBS in "
Mary", which suffered from poor reviews, sagging ratings, and internal strife within the production crew. According to Moore, she asked CBS to pull the show, as she was unhappy with the direction of the program and the producers.
She also starred in the unsuccessful "dramedy",
Annie McGuire, in 1988.
In the mid-1990's, she'd a cameo and a guest starring role as herself on two episodes of
Ellen. She subsequently also guest starred on
Ellen DeGeneres next TV show,
The Ellen Show, in 2001.
In 2004, Moore reunited with her
Dick Van Dyke Show castmates for a reunion "episode" called
The Dick Van Dyke Show Revisited. In August 2005, Moore guest-starred as Christine St. George, a high-strung host of a fictional TV show on three episodes of
Fox sitcom That '70s Show. Moore's scenes were shot on the same
soundstage where
The Mary Tyler Moore Show was filmed in the 1970s.
Theatre
Moore appeared in several Broadway plays. She appeared in
Whose Life Is It Anyway, which opened on
Broadway at the
Royale Theatre on February 24, 1980 and ran for 96 performances; and
Sweet Sue which opened at the
Music Box Theatre (transferred to the Royale Theatre) on Jan. 8, 1988 and ran for 164 performances. She was the star of a new musical version of
Breakfast at Tiffany's in December 1966, but the show, titled
Holly, was a notorious flop that closed out-of-town before reaching Broadway. An
urban legend has it that when Mary, as Holly, announced that she miscarried her baby, the audience applauded.
She appeared in previews of the
Neil Simon play
Rose's Dilemma at the
Manhattan Theatre Club in December 2003 but quit before the show opened.
During the 1980s Moore and her production company produced five plays:
Noises Off,
The Octette Bridge Club,
Joe Egg,
Benefactors, and
Safe Sex.
Movies
Moore made her film debut in 1961's
X-15. She subsequently appeared in a string of 1960s films, including
1967's
Thoroughly Modern Millie with
Julie Andrews, and 1968's
What's So Bad About Feeling Good? and
Don't Just Stand There!. In 1969 she starred opposite
Elvis Presley as a nun in
Change of Habit. Moore's future television castmate
Ed Asner also appeared in that film.
Moore was nominated for the
Best Actress for 1980's
Ordinary People. Other feature film credits include
Six Weeks,
Just Between Friends,
Flirting with Disaster,
Labor Pains and
Cheats.
Moore has appeared in a number of telefilms, such as,
Mary's Incredible Dream,
Run a Crooked Mile,
Heartsounds,
The Gin Game (based on the Broadway play),
Mary and Rhoda,
Lincoln (as
Mary Todd Lincoln),
Finnegan Begin Again,
The Best Year,
Miss Lettie and Me,
Stolen Babies and
Payback.
Personal life
In 1955, aged 18, she married Richard Meeker, whom she described as "the boy next door", and was pregnant with her only son Richie (which, coincidentally, was also the name of her TV son on
The Dick Van Dyke Show) within six weeks. Meeker and Moore divorced in 1961.
Moore married
Grant Tinker, an
NBC executive in 1962, and in 1970 they formed the television production company
MTM Enterprises, which created and produced the company's first television series,
The Mary Tyler Moore Show. MTM Enterprises would later produce popular American sitcoms and drama television series such as
Rhoda and
Phyllis (both spin-offs from
The Mary Tyler Moore Show),
The Bob Newhart Show,
WKRP in Cincinnati,
Hill Street Blues, and
Newhart. Moore and Tinker divorced in 1979.
Charity work
In addition to her acting work, Moore is the International Chairman of the
Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation International. In this role, she's used her fame to help raise funds and raise awareness of
diabetes mellitus type 1, which she has, almost losing her vision and at least one limb to the disease.
In 2007, in honor of Moore's dedication to the Foundation, JDRF created the "Forever Moore" research initiative which will support JDRF's Academic Research and Development and JDRF's Clinical Development Program. The program works on translating basic research advances into new treatments and technologies for those living with type 1 diabetes.
Mary also adopted a
Golden Retriever puppy from Yankee Golden Retriever Rescue in Hudson, Massachusetts.
Moore is a
pesco-vegetarian (
pescetarian) and has worked for animal rights for many years. On the subject of fur, she's said, "Behind every beautiful fur, there's a story. It is a bloody, barbaric story."
She is also a co-founder of Broadway Barks, an annual animal adopt-a-thon held in New York City. Moore and friend
Bernadette Peters work tirelessly to make New York City a no-kill city and to promote adopting animals from shelters.
Moore is a supporter of
embryonic stem cell research and said of President
George W. Bush's announcement to veto the Senate's bill supporting the research, "This is an intelligent human being with a heart, and I don't see how much longer he can deny those aspects of himself."
Honors
In early May 2002, Moore was present as cable TV network
TV Land dedicated a statue in downtown
Minneapolis to the television character she made famous on
Mary Tyler Moore. The statue is in front of the
Dayton's (now
Macy's) department store, near the corner of 7th Street and
Nicollet Mall. It depicts the well-known moment in the show's opening credits where Mary joyfully throws her
tam o'shanter cap in the air, in a freeze-frame at the end of the montage.
Fans have noted that the statue takes liberties with that opening scene, for both practical and artistic reasons. One is that where Mary actually tossed the cap was in the
crosswalk in the middle of the street-- clearly not the best location for a statue. The other is that the actual release point of the cap was around her waist, whereas the statue has her hand high overhead, barely touching the cap, as if she were catching it instead of tossing it.
The table where she dined during the opening credits at the Basil's Restaurant, located in the Marquette Hotel, looks out over the IDS center crystal court, and has a plaque designating it as "the Mary Tyler Moore Table."
Filmography
Television
Film
X-15 (1961)
Thoroughly Modern Millie (1967)
What's So Bad About Feeling Good? (1968)
Don't Just Stand There! (1968)
Run a Crooked Mile (1969) (TV)
Change of Habit (1969)
Ordinary People (1980)
Six Weeks (1982)
Just Between Friends (1986)
Flirting with Disaster (1996)
The Blue Arrow (1996) (voice)
Keys to Tulsa (1997)
Reno Finds Her Mom (1998)
Labor Pains (2000)
Cheats (2002)Further Information
Get more info on 'Mary Tyler Moore'.
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