Rae Allen

Rae Julia Theresa Abruzzo (July 3, 1926 – April 6, 2022), professionally known as Rae Allen, was an American actress of stage, film and television. Her career spanned some seventy years and eight decades. Rae started her career in theatre in 1941 in a production of Gilbert and Sullivan and made her debut on Broadway in 1948, moving to television and film roles in 1958, making her screen debut in Damn Yankees. She appeared in numerous guest roles in TV shows, but she was best known of recurring parts in sitcom All in the Family (1972-1973) and in The Sopranos. Her film roles included A League of Their Own (1992) and Stargate. Early and personal life Allen was born as Rae Julia Theresa Abruzzo in Brooklyn, New York City on July 3, 1926, to Julia (née Riccio), a seamstress and hairdresser and Joseph Abruzzo, an opera singer and chauffeur, whose brothers acted in vaudeville. At the age of 25, she played Buttercup in H.M.S. Pinafore. Rae Allen trained at the HB Studio in New York City's Greenwich Village. She graduated from the American Academy of Dramatic Arts in 1947. She was first married to John M. Allen and then divorced; and later married and divorced, politician Herbert Harris. Rae Allen died in her sleep on April 6, 2022, at the age of 95 at the Motion Picture & Television Fund retirement community in Woodland Hills, CA. She is survived by her four nieces: Nadine (McCann), Laura, Deborah, and Betty Cosgrove.