- Born
- Died
- Making a career out of a post-nasal drip, this scene-stealing character comedienne was one of the best Broadway and Hollywood had to offer. It's too bad, then, that she wasn't utilized in films more often for this slight, chinless, parrot-faced, squawky-voiced bundle of (kill)joy could draw laughs from a well with a mere sniffle, gulp, or stare.
Plaintive Alice Pearce was born in New York City, the only child of a bank vice-president, but was raised in different European schools -- wherever her father had business. Eventually Alice settled back in NYC and began to gather experience in summer stock shows. She became a huge hit on the nightclub circuit which eventually paved the way to Broadway. She drew raves in the "New Faces of 1943" and was sensational in the role of Lucy Schmeeler, the sexless, adenoidal blind date, in the New York smash "On the Town" the very next year. As a testament to her talent, Alice was the only performer kept on board when Gene Kelly transferred the sailors-on-leave musical to film. Strangely, this did not lead to a slew of comedy vehicles, but Alice certainly sparked a number of fluffy films, even in the tiniest of roles -- never more so than as the hypochondriac patient who expounds on her physical ailments ad nauseam while overly-attentive Jerry Lewis suffers through a wrenching series of "sympathy pains" in The Disorderly Orderly (1964). It's slapstick comedy at its very best.
TV proved an attractive medium for her as well, hosting her own variety show briefly in 1949. Her career ended on a high note as the nagging, irrepressibly nosy neighbor Gladys Kravitz in the Bewitched (1964) sitcom. Ideally teamed with George Tobias as her hen-pecked husband, Abner, the two provided non-stop hilarity -- her frightened gulps, blank gaze and confused exasperation coupled with his dour disgust was comedy heaven. Sadly, Pearce developed ovarian cancer and died in 1966, only two seasons into the show. She was only 48. She quite deservedly won an Emmy trophy for her work a few months after her death. Hollywood lost a treasured talent in Alice Pearce, gone way before her time.- IMDb Mini Biography By: Gary Brumburgh / gr-home@pacbell.net
- SpousesPaul Davis(September 20, 1964 - March 3, 1966) (her death)John Rox(May 22, 1948 - August 5, 1957) (his death)
- Won a posthumous comedy supporting actress Emmy for her side-splitting work as neighborhood snoop Gladys Kravitz on Bewitched (1964). Her award was accepted by her husband, Paul Davis. Only two years later, Marion Lorne, as delightfully dithery Aunt Clara, also won a posthumous Emmy in the very same acting category. Elizabeth Montgomery accepted the award for Ms. Lorne.
- Star Elizabeth Montgomery and husband/director William Asher helped Alice's husband Paul Davis after her death by giving him a job as a director on Bewitched (1964). Davis, once a Broadway director, had given up his career to nurse Alice through her final illness.
- ABC broke into the prime-time broadcast of Bewitched (1964) to announce her death.
- In May of 1964 she had surgery and was already diagnosed with terminal cancer by the time she began Bewitched (1964) in September of that year. She managed to keep it a secret and passed away 1-1/2 years into the series.
- Alice portrayed blind date Lucy Schmeeler in the original Broadway stage version of "On the Town" and reprised her role in the classic movie musical On the Town (1949).
- I feel the progress of the disease in my case is unusual because of my mental attitude. I am a supremely happy woman. I have never been beautiful, but I have been blessed with a rich career and the love of two fine men. The strength I have found in the devotion of my dear Paul is beyond measure.
- Dear Heart (1965) - $3,000
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