Allyn Ann McLerie
Allyn Ann McLerie
Gamine-like Canadian singer-dancer Allyn Ann McLerie built her reputation on Broadway, where she made her debut at 16 in the chorus of One Touch of Venus. She rose to stardom playing soubrette roles in such hits as Leonard Bernstein's On the Town and Irving Berlin's Miss Liberty Four years after her tentative movie debut in the 1948 MGM feature Words and Music Ms. McLerie won a Warner Bros. contract when she repeated her Broadway role of Amy Spettigue in the film version of Frank Loesser's Where's Charley? Rapidly outgrowing the wearisome ingenues assigned her by the studio, Allyn temporarily retired in 1954. Resuming her acting, singing and dancing lessons in the mid-1960s, Allyn slowly reemerged as a versatile character actress, popping up in such small but powerful roles as Red Buttons' psychotic dance partner in They Shoot Horses, Don't They (1969) and the "wrong" White House source in All the President's Men (1976). On TV, she played spinsterish secretary Janet Reubner on The Tony Randall Show (1976-78), while on the 1987 critic's darling Days and Nights of Molly Dodd she portrayed Molly's divorced mother. Allyn Ann McLerie has been married twice, to actor/playwright/lyricist Adolph Green and to Broadway leading man George Gaynes. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
Filmography of Allyn Ann McLerie:
- Calamity Jane with Doris Day , Howard Keel , Philip Carey , Paul Harvey
- Battle Cry with Van Heflin , Aldo Ray , Mona Freeman , Nancy Olson , James Whitmore , Tab Hunter , Dorothy Malone , Raymond Massey , Anne Francis , Perry Lopez , Fess Parker , Rhys Williams , L.Q. Jones
- Death Scream with Ed Asner , Eric Braeden , Art Carney , Diahann Carroll , Bert Freed , Helen Hunt , Raul Julia , Sally Kirkland , Cloris Leachman
Allyn Ann McLerie Trivia
