Alice Drummond Dies; Veteran Character Actress Was 88
Alice Drummond, a prolific character actress nominated for a Best Featured Actress Tony in 1970 and known for appearances in the films Awakenings, Synecdoche, New York and Ghostbusters, among many others, died November 30 from complications following a fall in her home. She was 88. The news was confirmed by Drummond’s friend, June Gable, to The New York Times.
Born in 1928 in Pawtucket, Rhode Island, Drummond was a 1950 graduate of Pembroke College, then the women’s school at Brown University. She began her acting career following a move to New York with fellow actor Paul Drummond, whom she married in 1951. (They divorced in 1976). A regular on and off- Broadway over the next four decades, Drummond was nominated for a Tony for her performance in Murray Schisgal’s The Chinese. Earlier, she appeared in an off-Broadway revival of Edward Albee’s The American Dream and in 1980 at The American Place Theatre in the ensemble of Lavonne Mueller’s Killings On The Last Line. One of her most notable performances was as Aunt Ruth in the 1991 New York premiere of Scott McPherson’s Marvin’s Room.
Drummond also played many memorable and sometimes iconic character roles on film and television. Among them, in the 1960s she appeared on the supernatural soap opera Dark Shadows, in the role of Nurse Jackson; as a New York City librarian in the beginning of the original Ghostbusters; and as a a patient in the 1990 Robin Williams film Awakenings. She was a regular on the CBS soap Where the Heart Is, appearing on the show until it ended its run in 1973, and later appeared briefly on As the World Turns, another CBS soap.
Among many television guest spots, she appeared on Spin City, Boston Legal, Ed, Law & Order, The Days and Nights of Molly Dodd, and Grace Under Fire.
Her most recent film appearance was in the family comedy Furry Vengeance in 2010.
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