Mary Tyler Moore

Infobox actor
name = Mary Tyler Moore


imagesize = 210px
caption = Mary Tyler Moore at the 45th Emmy Awards Governor's Ball, September 19, 1993.
birthdate = birth date and age|1936|12|29
birthplace = Brooklyn, New York, USA
yearsactive = 1958-present
spouse = Robert Levine (1983-present)
Grant Tinker (1962-1981)
Dick Meeker (1955-1961)
emmyawards = Actress of the Year
1974 "The Mary Tyler Moore Show"
Outstanding Lead Actress - Comedy Series
1964 "The Dick Van Dyke Show"
1966 "The Dick Van Dyke Show"
1973 "The Mary Tyler Moore Show"
1974 "The Mary Tyler Moore Show"
1976 "The Mary Tyler Moore Show"
Outstanding Supporting Actress - Miniseries or a Movie
1993 "Stolen Babies"
tonyawards = Special Tony Award
1980 "Whose Life Is It Anyway?"
Best Revival of a Play
1985 "A Day in the Death of Joe Egg"
goldenglobeawards = Best TV Star - Female
1965 "The Dick Van Dyke Show"
Best Actress - Musical or Comedy Series
1971 "The Mary Tyler Moore Show"
Best Actress - Motion Picture Drama
1981 "Ordinary People"

Mary Tyler Moore (born December 29, 1936) is an Academy Award-nominated and seven-time Emmy Award-winning American actress and comedienne, 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 animal rights and diabetes.

Biography

Early life

Moore, eldest of three siblings, was born in the Brooklyn Heights section of Brooklyn, New York, the daughter of Marjorie (née Hackett) and George Tyler Moore, a clerk. [cite news | author=Somini Sengupta| title=Brooklyn's Girl Next Door? | url=http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9D0CE1DB1139F937A25757C0A960958260 | work=The New York Times | date=14 April 1996 | accessdate=2008-03-19] 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 Angele] 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 would 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 had turned down earlier. Moore's energetic comic 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 and husband Grant Tinker successfully pitched a sitcom centered around Moore to CBS. "The Mary Tyler Moore Show" was 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 would 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-1990s, she had 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". It was later sold to Television South, an ITV Franchise holder during the 1980's. Moore and Tinker divorced in 1979.

Since 1983, she has been married to Dr. Robert Levine.

Charity work

In addition to her acting work, Moore is the International Chairman of the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation International. In this role, she has 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. She also was a lobster rights activist and promoted her cause on the sitcom "Ellen."

Moore is a pesco-vegetarian (pescetarian) and has worked for animal rights for many years. [cite interview | subject=Mary Tyler Moore | interviewer=Larry King | type=Interview | url=http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0507/01/lkl.01.html | format=Transcript| program=Larry King live | callsign=CNN | date=2001-05-07 | accessdate=2008-03-19] On the subject of fur, she has said, "Behind every beautiful fur, there is 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.

In honor of her father, George Tyler Moore, who was a life-long Civil War enthusiast, Mary donated funds to acquire an historic structure in Shepherdstown, West Virginia for Shepherd College (now Shepherd University) to be used as a center for Civil War studies. This center, named the George Tyler Moore Center for the Study of the Civil War resides in the historic Conrad Shindler house (ca. 1795) - named in honor of Mary's ancestor who owned the structure between 1815 and 1852. [http://www.shepherd.edu/gtmcweb/]

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." [cite news | author=The Associated Press | title=Senate Passes Embryonic Stem Cell Bill | url=http://www.newsmax.com/archives/articles/2006/7/18/170020.shtml | work=NewsMax.com | date=19 July 2006 | accessdate=2008-03-19]

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."She is featured in the Weezer song "Buddy Holly"To show her gratitude for being mentioned in the song, she signed a copy of the song's single release and sent it to Weezer.

Filmography

Television

*"Richard Diamond, Private Detective"
*"The Dick Van Dyke Show" (1961-1966)
*"Run a Crooked Mile" (1969)
*"The Mary Tyler Moore Show" (1970-1977)
*"Mary" (1978)
*"First, You Cry" (1978)
*"The Mary Tyler Moore Hour" (1979)
*"Heartsounds" (1984)
*"Finnegan Begin Again" (1985)
*"Mary" (1985-1986)
*"Lincoln" (1988)
*"Annie McGuire" (1988)
*"The Last Best Year" (1990)
*"Thanksgiving Day (TV series)" (1990)
*"Stolen Babies" (1993)
*"New York News" (1995)
*"" (1996)
*"Ellen" (1996)
*"Payback" (1997)
*"Good as Gold" (2000)
*"Mary and Rhoda" (2000)
*"" (2001)
*"The Ellen Show" (2001)
*"Miss Lettie and Me" (2002)
*"The Gin Game" (2003)
*"Blessings (TV movie)" (2003)
*"The Dick Van Dyke Show Revisited" (2004)
*"Snow Wonder" (2005)
*"That 70's Show" (2006)
*"Lipstick Jungle" (2008)
*"Oprah" (May 19, 2008)

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)
*"Cheats" (2002)
*"Labor Pains" (2009)

References

*cite book | last=Moore | first=Mary Tyler | title=After All | location=New York | publisher=Dell | year=1996 | isbn=0440223032

External links

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* [http://www.museum.tv/archives/etv/M/htmlM/mooremaryt/mooremaryt.htm The Museum of Broadcast Communications biography of Moore]
* [http://www.mtmshow.com/ "The Mary Tyler Moore Show" Online]
* [http://www.pbs.org/hollywoodpresents/gingame/dvd/dvd_mary.html "Remembering the Dick Van Dyke Show" (Mary Tyler Moore)]
* [http://goldrush.aol.com/glog/2006/10/23/mary_tyler_moore_quiz/?ncid=AOLGRH0005000000033 "Take The Mary Tyler Moore Show" Quiz]
* [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VfhJwcpFFK4&eurl= True man true song]
* [http://www.kruegerbooks.com/books/sig/moore-mary-tyler.html Signature of Mary Tyler Moore on her Book - After All]