Blazing Saddles actress Carol Arthur has died at 85... after 11-year battle with Alzheimer's disease
- Carol Arthur died aged 85, after an 11-year-battle with Alzheimer's disease on Sunday in Woodland Hills, California
- The celebrated actress portrayed Rock Ridge schoolmarm Harriett Van Johnson in the 1974 classic Blazing Saddles
- Carol Arthur died aged 85, after an 11-year-battle with Alzheimer's disease on Sunday in Woodland Hills, California
- Director Mel Brooks said in a statement: 'She was my lifelong friend, and she will be missed'
Blazing Saddles actress Carol Arthur has died aged 85, after an 11-year-battle with Alzheimer's disease.
Arthur was the widow of comedian Dom DeLuise, and starred in four Mel Brooks movies as well as appearing on Broadway.
Her family announced the news on Monday, saying that Arthur passed away Sunday at the Mary Pickford House at the Motion Picture & Television Fund home in Woodland Hills, where she had lived there since 2015, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
RIP: Blazing Saddles actress Carol Arthur has died at 85... after 11-year battle with Alzheimer's disease
The celebrated actress portrayed Rock Ridge schoolmarm Harriett Van Johnson in the 1974 classic Blazing Saddles.
Director Mel Brooks said in a statement to THR: 'She was my lifelong friend, and she will be missed.'
Arthur also appeared in Brook's 1976 picture Silent Movie, Robin Hood: Men In Tights and Dracula: Dead And Loving It in 1995.
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Another one of the actress' most memorable roles was as a spokeswoman for the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission, dubbed Safety Sadie. She appeared in PSAs throughout the 1970s and 80s.
Arthur and DeLuise's romance began when she met the actor while performing in Summer and Smirk in 1963 at the Provincetown Playhouse.
Lifelong love: Arthur was the widow of comedian Dom DeLuise. They're seen in 1968 above
Blazing trails: The celebrated actress portrayed Rock Ridge schoolmarm Harriett Van Johnson in the 1974 classic Blazing Saddles. Director Mel Brooks said in a statement to THR: 'She was my lifelong friend, and she will be missed'
'This is who I want to spend my life with!' she said. 'He was funny. Bigger than life. He was so honest and so real. So passionate ... and intense.'
The couple was wed in 1965 and married until May 2009, when DeLuise' died from kidney failure.
Carol Jane Arata was born in Hackensack, New Jersey, on August 4, 1935.
She was the son of a police lieutenant and a piano teacher. Her entertainment chops may have come from her grandfather, who worked in vaudeville.
As a young woman she moved to New York City where she studied at the Feagin School of Dramatic Radio and Arts and the American Academy of Dramatic Arts.
She continued to earn her stripes as an understudy for Dody Goodman and Imogene Coca in national tours of Once Upon A Mattress.
Til death do us part: The couple was wed in 1965 and married until May 2009, when DeLuise' died from kidney failure
Arthur wowed while performing the first London production of the Comden-Green musical On The Town in 1963, earning major applause as she sang I Can Cook Too.
A year later she would debut on Broadway, appearing in the musical comedy High Spirits.
She made her Broadway debut a year later in the musical comedy High Spirits, directed by Noël Coward.
After that the actress got to star opposite Dick Van Dyke as Mrs. Paroo in the 1980 version of The Music Man, directed and choreographed by Michael Kidd.
She worked with Lauren Bacall in 1981 on the feature Woman Of The Year.
Through the years Arthur never shied away from working with husband DeLouise. They appeared in The World's Greatest Lover (1977), Hot Stuff (1979), The Princess and the Dwarf (1989), Driving Me Crazy (1991), The Good Bad Guy (1997), The Godson (1998) and Between the Sheets (2003), directed their son Michael, together.
The pair also worked together on CBS's 1968 The Dom DeLuise Show.
She is survived by son Peter and his wife Anne Marie, son David and his wife Julia, and son Michael, as well as grandchildren Jake, Destefano and Dylan and brother George.
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