Patricia Ann Carroll (May 5, 1927 – July 30, 2022) was an American actress and comedian. She is best known for providing the voice of Ursula in The Little Mermaid. She made guest appearances in many popular television series including The Mary Tyler Moore Show, Laverne & Shirley, and ER; she also had a regular role on The Danny Thomas Show as Bunny Halper. Carroll was an Emmy, Drama Desk, and Grammy Award winner, as well as a Tony Award nominee.
Early life Patricia Carroll was born in Shreveport, Louisiana, on May 5, 1927, to Maurice Clifton Carroll (d. 1963) and Kathryn Angela (née Meagher). Patricia’s family moved to Los Angeles when she was five years old, and she soon began acting in local productions. She graduated from Immaculate Heart High School and attended Catholic University of America after enlisting in the United States Army as a civilian actress technician.
Career Carroll began her acting career in 1947. She got her first acting credit as Lorelei Crawford in the 1948 film Hometown Girl. In 1952, she made her television debut in The Red Buttons Show. In 1955, her Broadway debut in Catch a Star! garnered her a nomination for a Tony Award for Best Featured Actress in a Musical. In 1956, Carroll won an Emmy Award for her work on Caesar's Hour. From 1961–1964, she was a regular on the sitcom Make Room for Daddy . She guest-starred in the drama anthology series The DuPont Show with June Allyson. She co-starred in the 1965 television production of Rodgers and Hammerstein's Cinderella as "Prunella", one of the wicked stepsisters. Carroll also appeared on many variety shows of the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s, such as The Steve Allen Show, The Danny Kaye Show, The Red Skelton Show, and The Carol Burnett Show.
In the late 1970s, Carroll's successful one-woman show, Gertrude Stein, Gertrude Stein, Gertrude Stein, by playwright Marty Martin, won several major theater awards; her recorded version won a 1980 Grammy Award for Best Spoken Word, Documentary or Drama.
In early 1976, Carroll was cast as Lily, the mother of Shirley Feeney, on the hit ABC situation comedy, Laverne & Shirley, in the episode "Mother Knows Worst" . She portrayed Pearl Markowitz, the mother of Adam Arkin's character Lenny Markowitz, in the 1977 CBS situation comedy Busting Loose. In 1978, she made a guest appearance on The Love Boat. Her television roles in the 1980s included newspaper owner Hope Stinson on the syndicated The Ted Knight Show (formerly Too Close for Comfort) during its final season in 1986, and Gussie Holt, the mother of Suzanne Somers's lead character in the syndicated sitcom She's the Sheriff (1987–1989).
Starting in the late 1980s, Carroll took several voice-over roles for cartoons, including A Pup Named Scooby-Doo, Galaxy High, Foofur, and the film A Goofy Movie. On the series Pound Puppies, she had a regular role voicing Katrina Stoneheart. On two Garfield television specials (A Garfield Christmas and Garfield's Thanksgiving), she portrayed Jon's feisty grandmother. She also voiced the character of Granny in the 2005 re-release of Hayao Miyazaki's My Neighbor Totoro.
In 1989, Carroll portrayed the sea witch Ursula in Disney's The Little Mermaid and sang "Poor Unfortunate Souls", which was later certified Platinum by RIAA. In interviews, Carroll referred to the role, her first as a villain, as one of the favorites of her career. She later reprised the role in other forms of media, including the Kingdom Hearts series of video games, the Little Mermaid television series, the Disney+ series The Wonderful World of Mickey Mouse, and various Disney theme parks attractions and shows, as well as voicing Ursula's crazy sister Morgana in the direct-to-video sequel The Little Mermaid II: Return to the Sea.
Carroll also appeared on a variety of game shows including You Don't Say, To Tell the Truth, Match Game 73, Password All-Stars, I've Got a Secret, and The $10,000 Pyramid.
A member of the Actors Studio, she also enjoyed a successful career in the theater, appearing in numerous plays including productions of Our Town and Sophocles's Electra. In 1990, she starred in The Merry Wives of Windsor at the Shakespeare Theatre at the Folger in the role of Sir John Falstaff, a balding knight with whiskers.
When drama critic Frank Rich of The New York Times reviewed her performance in The Merry Wives of Windsor, he wrote, "Her performance is a triumph from start to finish, and, I think, a particularly brave and moving one, with implications that go beyond this one production. Ms. Carroll and Mr. Kahn help revivify the argument that the right actresses can perform some of the great classic roles traditionally denied to women and make them their own. It's not a new argument, to be sure; female Hamlets stretch back into history. But what separates Ms. Carroll's Falstaff from some other similar casting experiments of late is that her performance exists to investigate a character rather than merely as ideological window dressing for a gimmicky production."
Personal life Carroll married Lee Karsian in 1955 and they had three children: one son, Sean, and two daughters, Kerry and actress Tara Karsian. The marriage ended in a divorce in 1976. Lee remarried before he died in 1991. Carroll also outlived her son Sean, who died in 2009. In 1991, Carroll received an honorary doctorate from Siena College in Albany, New York.
After reading an article claiming that video games were not for people born prior to 1965, Carroll started playing video games. While on the road for Gertrude Stein Gertrude Stein Gertrude Stein, she became a "video game junkie". She at first played at parlors, then bought herself a home computer.
Hanna-Barbera lawsuit In 1963, Carroll filed a $12,000 lawsuit against Hanna-Barbera for breach of contract, claiming that she had been cast and signed on to the role of Jane Jetson on The Jetsons. Morey Amsterdam, who alleged that he had been cast as George, was also a plaintiff in the same suit. Although her contracts stipulated she would be paid US$500 an episode with a guarantee of twenty-four episodes (i.e., a full season), she recorded only one episode before being replaced. Several sources claimed the change had occurred as a result of sponsor conflict with Carroll's work on Make Room for Daddy.The Evening Sentinel, June 1, 1962, Morey Amsterdam and Pat Carroll have been forced off as "voice" stars of ABC's new animated "The Jetsons" cartoon series. Too many sponsor conflicts, what with Morey being a regular on the Dick Van Dyke Show and Pat likewise on the Danny Thomas Show. The case had been closed by early 1965 and the court had ruled in favor of Hanna-Barbera.
Death Carroll died of pneumonia at her home on Cape Cod, Massachusetts, on July 30, 2022, at the age of 95.
Filmography Film Year Title Role Notes 1948Hometown Girl Lorelei Crawford Film debut 1951Up Front Italian Girl Uncredited 1968With Six You Get Eggroll Maxine Scott 1973 The Brothers O'Toole Callie Burdyne 1984 Racing with the Moon Mrs. Spangler 1988 My Neighbor Totoro Granny Voice, 2005 Disney English dub 1989 The Little Mermaid UrsulaVoice2000 Songcatcher Viney Butler The Little Mermaid II: Return to the Sea MorganaVoice; direct-to-video 2001 Mickey's Magical Christmas: Snowed in at the House of Mouse Ursula 2002 Mickey's House of Villains 2005 Once Upon a Halloween Performer of "Sidekicks and Henchmen"2007 Freedom Writers Miep Gies Nancy Drew Landlady 2014 BFFs Joan 2023 Once Upon a Studio UrsulaVoice (archival recordings)
Television
The Red Buttons Show (1952–1953) The Saturday Night Revue (1953) Make Room for Daddy (1953) The Pepsi-Cola Playhouse (1954) Studio 57 (1954) – Sue Caesar's Hour (1954) – Alice Brewster Producers' Showcase (1955) – Gym teacher Kraft Television Theatre (1955) The Jimmy Durante Show (1955) The Steve Allen Show (1958) Hobby Lobby (1959) General Electric Theater (1959) – Frances Dowd The DuPont Show with June Allyson (1959) – Cherry The Ann Sothern Show (1961) – Pandora The Investigators (1961) – Blossom Taylor (episode "The Dead End Man") The United States Steel Hour (1961) The Danny Thomas Show (1961–1964) - Bunny Halper The Red Skelton Show (1962) Cinderella (1965) – Prunella Please Don't Eat the Daisies (1966) – Carol Baker The Carol Burnett Show (1971) – Herself; Two appearances in 1971 (Season 4, Episodes 16 and 23) The Mary Tyler Moore Show (1971) – Loretta Kuhne The Interns (1971) – Maria Love, American Style (1970–1971) Getting Together (1971–1972) – Rita Simon Police Story (1974) – Mrs. Gail Bannister Nakia (1974) – Belle Jones in episode "A Matter of Choice" Laverne & Shirley (1976) – Lily Feeney Good Heavens (1976) – Harriet Busting Loose (1977) – Pearl Markowitz Police Woman (1977) – Miriam Stein The Love Boat (1978) – Muriel Legends of the Superheroes (1979) – Esther Hall Trapper John, M.D. (1985) – Aunt Mo Crazy Like a Fox (1985) Yogi's Treasure Hunt (1985) – Additional Voices Pound Puppies (1986) – Katrina Stoneheart (voice) Galaxy High School (1986) – Ms. Biddy McBrain (voice) Foofur (1986–1987) – Hazel (voice) Too Close for Comfort (1986–1987) – Mrs. Hope Stinson A Garfield Christmas (1987) – Grandma (voice) She's the Sheriff (1987–1989) – Gussie Holt Superman (1988) – Queen Hippolyta (voice) A Pup Named Scooby-Doo (1989) – Paula P. Casso (voice) Garfield's Thanksgiving (1989) – Grandma (voice) Chip 'n Dale Rescue Rangers (1990) – Koo-Koo (voice) Designing Women (1993) – Mrs. Billie Beecham The Little Mermaid (1993–1994) – Ursula (voice) The Royale (1996) – Mildred Wak House of Mouse (2001–2002) – Ursula (voice, 3 episodes) ER (2005) – Rebecca Chadwick (3 episodes) Tangled: The Series (2017–2018) – Old Lady Crowley (voice, short "Make Me Smile" and episodes "One Angry Princess", "Max's Enemy" and "Secret of the Sun Drop") The Wonderful World of Mickey Mouse (2020) – Ursula (voice, episode "Keep on Rollin")
Video games Kingdom Hearts (2002) – Ursula (voice) Kingdom Hearts II (2005) – Ursula (voice) Kingdom Hearts 3D: Dream Drop Distance (2012) – Ursula (voice) Disney Princess: My Fairytale Adventure (2012) – Ursula (voice) Disney Dreamlight Valley (2023) – Ursula (voice; final role, released posthumously)
Theme parks Fantasmic! - Ursula (voice)
Stage +YearTitleRole(s)NotesRef.1955Catch a Star!performerBroadway debut Tony Award nomination1973Anything GoesReno Sweeney1975Something's Afoot1979Gertrude Stein Gertrude Stein Gertrude SteinGertrude SteinDrama Desk Award 1984Dancing in the End ZoneMadeleine Bernard1986Romeo and JulietNurse1989CinderellaFairy Godmother1990The Merry Wives of WindsorFalstaff1992The Show-OffMrs. Fisher1993Mother Courage and Her ChildrenMother Courage1996VolponeVolpone1998Grace and GlorieGraceElectraChorus of Mycenae2000Thoroughly Modern MillieMrs. MeersPre-Broadway production2002Our TownThe Stage Manager
References Notes
Further reading Lucas, Eddie (2011) "Livingroom Legends: Chats with TV's Famous Faces: Interview With Pat Carroll".
External links