Carol Bruce

Carol Bruce (November 15, 1919 – October 9, 2007) was an American band singer, Broadway star, and film and television actress. She was born Shirley Levy in Great Neck, New York to Beatrice and Harry Levy.She began her career as a singer in the late 1930s with Larry Clinton and his band. A graduate of Erasmus Hall High School in Brooklyn, New York, she made her Broadway debut in Louisiana Purchase," with songs by Irving Berlin who discovered her at a nightclub in Newark, New Jersey. She was the first actress to play the role of Julie in a Broadway production of Jerome Kern and Oscar Hammerstein II's Show Boat since the 1932 Broadway revival. Bruce played the role onstage in 1946 and garnered favorable comparisons to Helen Morgan, who had originated the role onstage in 1927 and repeated it in both the 1932 revival and the 1936 film. After a long career as a singer and in films, Bruce is probably best-remembered for her recurring role as the domineering and meddlesome "Mama Carlson" (mother of the station manager played by Gordon Jump) on CBS' WKRP in Cincinnati. Sylvia Sidney played Mr. Carlson's mother in the Pilot episode.

Personal facts

Birth dateNovember 15, 1919
Birth nameShirley Levy
Birth place
Great Neck New York , United States
Date of deathOctober 09, 2007
Place of death
Woodland Hills Los Angeles , United States

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