Doro Merande
Acting
Biography
Plain, angular Doro Merande was one of those delightful character actresses you couldn't take your eyes off of, no matter how minuscule the part. She excelled at playing older than she was -- doting aunts, inveterate gossips, curt secretaries and small-minded townspeople -- all topped with an amusing warble in her voice and bristly eccentric edge. Too bad then that she wasn't used more in films, but she preferred live theater and based herself for the most part on the East Coast. She was born Dora Matthews in Kansas in 1892 and orphaned as a child. Growing up in boarding schools, she headed to New York and pursued an acting career immediately after finishing her education. She appeared long and hard on the stock stage before making it on Broadway at age 43. She settled there sparking over 25 Broadway plays in her lifetime, including a scene-stealing turn in the classic Thorton Wilder play "Our Town" which brought her to Hollywood to preserve the role on film. On and off she remained a delightful film and TV cameo player with roles in The Gazebo (1959), The Russians Are Coming, The Russians Are Coming (1966), and The Front Page (1974). She and star Enid Markey (Jane of the "Tarzan" film silents) starred together as pampering aunts in the sitcom Bringing Up Buddy (1960), but, despite promising ratings, the two veteran actresses did not get along and the series folded after only a season. Ms. Merande was also a recurring presence for Jackie Gleason on his variety show. She died, in fact, of a stroke while there in Miami to film an episode. Date of Birth 31 March 1892, Columbia, Kansas Date of Death 1 November 1975, New York City, New York (stroke)
Known For
An anthology series containing drama, psychological thriller, fantasy, science fiction, suspense, and/or horror, often concluding with a macabre or unexpected twist.
The Twilight Zone
Thriller is an American anthology television series that aired during the 1960–61 and 1961–62 seasons on NBC. The show featured host Boris Karloff introducing a mix of self-contained, macabre weird-horror and morbid, hitchockian crime stories, in some of which he also starred.
Thriller
Omnibus is an American, commercially sponsored, educational television series.
Omnibus
A television anthology series hosted by Alfred Hitchcock featuring dramas, thrillers, and mysteries.
Alfred Hitchcock Presents
Tales of Tomorrow is an American anthology science fiction series that was performed and broadcast live on ABC from 1951 to 1953. The series covered such stories as Frankenstein, starring Lon Chaney, Jr., 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea starring Thomas Mitchell as Captain Nemo, and many others featuring such performers as Boris Karloff, Brian Keith, Lee J. Cobb, Rod Steiger, Bruce Cabot, Franchot Tone, Gene Lockhart, Walter Abel, Leslie Nielsen, and Paul Newman. The series had many similarities to the later Twilight Zone which also covered one of the same stories, "What You Need". In total it ran for eighty-five 30-minute episodes.
Tales of Tomorrow
Sam Benedict is an American legal drama that aired on NBC from September 1962 to March 1963. The series was created and executive produced by E. Jack Neuman. Sam Benedict is based on real-life lawyer Jacob W. "Jake" Erlich, who served as technical consultant for the series.
Sam Benedict
No description available.
The New Breed
When his family goes away for summer vacation, a hitherto faithful publishing executive with an overactive imagination is tempted by an attractive new neighbor.
The Seven Year Itch
A young Catholic priest from Boston confronts bigotry, Nazism, and his own personal conflicts as he rises to the office of cardinal.
The Cardinal
Bringing Up Buddy is an American situation comedy which aired on CBS during the 1960–1961 season.
Bringing Up Buddy
When illegal card dealer and recovering heroin addict Frankie Machine gets out of prison, he decides to straighten up. Armed with nothing but an old drum set, Frankie tries to get honest work as a drummer. But when his former employer and his old drug dealer re-enter his life, Frankie finds it hard to stay clean and eventually finds himself succumbing to his old habits.
The Man with the Golden Arm
When a Soviet submarine gets stuck on a sandbar off the coast of a New England island, its commander orders his second-in-command, Lieutenant Rozanov, to get them moving again before there is an international incident. Rozanov seeks assistance from the island locals, including the police chief and a vacationing television writer, while trying to allay their fears of a Communist invasion by claiming he and his crew are Norwegian sailors.
The Russians Are Coming! The Russians Are Coming!
Ruthless Chicago newspaper editor Walter Burns resorts to dubious motives in order to get top reporter Hildy Johnson to cover one more big crime story before retirement.
The Front Page
TV writer Elliott Nash buries a blackmailer under the new gazebo in his suburban backyard. But the nervous man can't let the body rest there.
The Gazebo
While traveling home from Vegas, an amorous lounge singer named Dino gets conned by a local mechanic/songwriter into staying in town for the night. The mechanic's songwriting partner, Orville, offers Dino his home for overnight lodging and enlists a local waitress/call girl to pose as his wife in order to placate Dino's urges.
Kiss Me, Stupid
Ex-gangster Tony Banks is called out of retirement by mob kingpin God to carry out a hit on fellow mobster "Blue Chips" Packard. When Banks demurs, God kidnaps his daughter Darlene on his luxury yacht.
Skidoo
A ruthless Southern opportunist tries to buy his cousin's land, and when thwarted, brings several tragedies to the lives of his loved ones.
Hurry Sundown
Change comes slowly to a small New Hampshire town in the early 20th century. We see birth, life and death in this small community.
Our Town
A newly promoted plant supervisor finds himself in the position of having to announce a layoff of his fellow workers.
The Whistle at Eaton Falls
Posing as a man over 70, a lecturer (Clifton Webb) enters an old-folks home to prove age is a state of mind.