Polly Holliday

Polly Holliday was born on Jul 02, 1937 in USA. Polly Holliday's big-screen debut came with W.W. and the Dixie Dancekings directed by John G. Avildsen in 1975. Polly Holliday is known for Mrs. Doubtfire directed by Chris Columbus, Robin Williams stars as Daniel Hillard and Sally Field as Miranda Hillard. Polly Holliday has got 3 awards and 6 nominations so far. The most recent award Polly Holliday achieved is Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy & Horror Films, USA. The upcoming new movie Polly Holliday plays is Fair Game which will be released on Dec 03, 2010.

The normally erudite, soft-spoken and well-mannered Alabama-born (July 2, 1937) actress Polly Dean Holliday, daughter of a truck driver, accumulated quite an extensive theater background by the time she hit sassy, blue-collar stardom on 70s TV as gum-cracking waitress Florence Jean Castleberry on the highly popular sitcom Alice (1976).Following her studies at Alabama College for Women, where she appeared in such productions as "Medea" and "The Lady's Not for Burning" and at Florida State University, Polly began her professional stage career in outdoor drama in North Carolina before joining the Asolo Repertory Company in Sarasota, Florida, and becoming a long, respected company member. During her initial residency (1962-1972), she appeared in such classic and contemporary productions as "The Way of the World" (1962), "Major Barbara" (1967), "As You Like It" (1967), "Look Back in Anger" (1968), "Joe Egg" (1970), "Candida" (title role, 1971), "The Subject Was Roses" (1971) and "House of Blue Leaves" (1971). Later roles with the company included "Hay Fever" (1974) and "Free and Clear" (2004). Polly worked long and hard to disguise her Alabama drawl while building up a sturdy classical reputation. At the same time, she supplemented her income teaching piano and also music in elementary schools.Making her off-Broadway debut in "Orphee" back in 1964, she moved to the East Coast in 1972 and appeared in New York productions of "Wedding Bond," and "The Girl Most Likely to Succeed" before taking her first Broadway bow in "All Over Town" directed by Dustin Hoffman in 1974. She then began appearing in small parts in such movies as Pittsville - Ein Safe voll Blut (1974), W.W. Dixie (1975) and Les hommes du président (1976)Polly won the flashy TV role of Flo in 1976. As the Southern-baked hash slinger who delightfully redefined trailer park trash, the actress gave a no-holds barred performance that earned her two Golden Globes awards and an Emmy nomination. She hit it so big with fans (her character introduced the catch phrase "Kiss mah grits!") that she was given her own spin-off, aptly titled Flo (1980). Surprisingly, the show lasted only one season despite another Emmy-nomination.To avoid severe typecasting, Polly veered away from the television limelight and returned to her first love, the theatre. She won renewed respect and critical notice on Broadway and in regional theatre for her performances in "A Sense of Humor" (1983), "Black Coffee" (1985), her eccentric Martha Brewster in "Arsenic and Old Lace" (1986), as Amanda Wingfield in "The Glass Menagerie" (1988), her Tony-nominated turn as Big Mama in "Cat on a Hot Tin Roof" (1990), "A Quarrel of Sparrows" (1993), her Veta in "Harvey" (1993), as spinster schoolteacher Flo Owens in "Picnic" (1994) and again off-Broadway in "Marco Polo Sings a Solo" (1998).From time to time, Polly has taken on feisty roles in both comic and dramatic films, such as the old crank who meets a freakish end in the box-office critter hit Gremlins (1984), and on TV wherein she briefly replaced Eileen Brennan as Captain Amanda Allen in the series Private Benjamin (1981) after Ms. Brennan's near-fatal car accident in 1982.Though Polly never recaptured the brash success of her Alice (1976) years, she has continued at a healthy pace primarily in guest spots. She nominally played wise and opinionated mothers and grandmothers on such shows as "Stir Crazy," "The Golden Girls," "Amazing Stories," "The Equalizer" and "Homicide: Life on the Streets." She also had recurring roles as Momma Love on the short-lived crime series The Client (1995) and as Patricia Richardson's mom on the hit sitcom Papa bricole (1991).Broaching the millennium she continued sporadically with featured parts in such films as Madame Doubtfire (1993), Mr. Wrong (1996), À nous quatre (1998), Stick It (2006), Les femmes de ses rêves (2007) and Fair Game (2010). She has also been featured on stage in such plays as "The Time of the Cuckoo" (2000), "Dividing the Estate" (2007), "A Christmas Carol" (2013) and "The Old Friends" (2014).