Cloris Leachman

American actress Cloris Leachman was born in Des Moines, Iowa, on April 30, 1926. She began acting in local plays as a teenager and competed in the 1946 Miss America pageant. That competition led to a scholarship to study under Elia Kazan at the Actors Studio in New York City, where she made her professional debut in 1948. Over a career spanning 79 years, she became a familiar face in Mel Brooks' ensemble, playing Frau Blücher in Young Frankenstein (1974), Nurse Diesel in High Anxiety (1977), and Madame Defarge in History of the World, Part I (1981). Leachman was also a beauty pageant contestant and model. She had blonde hair, blue eyes, and an athletic build. She passed away on January 27, 2021, at age 94.