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Kathleen Freeman (born February 17, 1919; died
August 23, 2001) was an American character actress
in film, television, and stage whose career
spanned more than fifty years. Most of her career
seemed to be spent playing an array of tart maids,
secretaries, teachers, busybodies, nurses, and
battle-axe neighbors, almost invariably to comic
effect. Born in Chicago, Illinois, Freeman began
her career as a child, dancing in her parents'
vaudeville act.  After a stint studying music at
UCLA, she went into acting full time, working on
the stage, and finally entering films in 1948. Her
most notable early role was an uncredited part in
the 1952 musical Singin' in the Rain, as Jean
Hagen's articulate diction coach Phoebe Dinsmore.
Beginning with the 1955 film Artists and Models,
she became a favorite foil of Jerry Lewis, playing
opposite him in ten movies. These included most of
Lewis's better known comedies, including The
Disorderly Orderly as Nurse Higgins, The Errand
Boy as the studio boss's wife, and especially The
Nutty Professor as Millie Lemon. Over thirty years
later, she had a small cameo in The Nutty
Professor II: The Klumps, a sequel to the remake
of the Lewis film. 

Still other film roles included appearances in the
horror film The Fly (1958), the Western
(genre)|Western spoofs Support Your Local Sheriff
(1969) and Support Your Local Gunfighter (1971),
and appearances in a spate of comedies in the
1980s and 1990s. She played Sister Mary Stigmata
in John Landis's The Blues Brothers and Blues
Brothers 2000, had cameos in Joe Dante's
Innerspace and Gremlins 2 (as tipsy cooking host
Microwave Marge in the latter), and a Ma Barker
type gangster mother in Naked Gun 33 1/3: The
Final Insult.

Freeman was also a familiar presence on
television, from the 1950s until her death, with
regular or recurring roles on many sitcoms,
including Topper (as Katie the maid), Hogan's
Heroes (as Frau Gertrude Linkmeyer, who longed to
wed Colonel Klink), The Beverly Hillbillies (in a
story arc as Flo Shafer, wife of conman Phil
Silvers), the short-lived prehistoric sitcom It's
About Time (as Mrs. Boss), and  as the voice of
Peg Bundy's mom, an unseen character on Married...
with Children. She played guest roles on countless
other shows, from I Love Lucy to Home Improvement.


In later years, she also worked extensively as a
voice actor, playing Ma Crackshell on DuckTales, a
Theban woman in The Walt Disney Company|Disney's
Hercules (1997 movie)|Hercules, and fortune teller
Madame Xima in the video game Curse of Monkey
Island. She remained active in her last two years,
with a regular voice role on As Told By Ginger, a
voice bit in Shrek, a guest appearance on Becker,
and most notably, scoring a Tony Award nomination
for her stage role of accompanist Jeannette
Burmeister in the Broadway theatre|Broadway
musical version of The Full Monty. Five days after
her last Full Monty performance, she died of lung
cancer.

==External links==
*imdb name|id=0293466|name=Kathleen Freeman
*http://www.lucyfan.com/kathleenfreeman.html
Kathleen Freeman Remembered