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Liz Sheridan dies at 93: Jerry Seinfeld pays tribute to ‘the sweetest, nicest TV mom a son could wish for’
- Region:
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Sheridan died in her sleep from natural causes, five days after her birthday on 10 April, her friend and long-time representative Amanda Hendon said.
Jerry Seinfeld has paid tribute to the “nicest TV mom” Liz Sheridan, who has died aged 93.
The US comedian, who starred alongside Sheridan in his eponymous sitcom Seinfeld, said he was lucky to have known the actress.
Sheridan died in her sleep from natural causes, five days after her birthday on 10 April, her friend and long-time representative Amanda Hendon said.
She played Seinfeld’s doting mother Helen in the popular comedy.
“Liz was always the sweetest, nicest TV mom a son could wish for,” Seinfeld wrote on Twitter, sharing a picture of the pair.
“Every time she came on our show it was the coziest feeling for me. So lucky to have known her.”
Sheridan died two weeks after Estelle Harris, who played George’s mother on the show.
As well as her famous role in Seinfeld, Sheridan also had a prolific stage career.
She appeared on Broadway in plays and musicals during the 1970s including Happy End with Meryl Streep and Ballroom.
A veteran TV, film, and stage actor, Sheridan was best known for the 20 or so appearances she made on landmark TV comedy Seinfeld in the 1990s, playing Jerry Seinfeld’s well-meaning mother, Helen. (She had a similar recurring but pivotal role on the same network in the ’80s as nosy neighbor Raquel Ochmonek on ALF.) A dancer and singer in addition to her work as an actor, Sheridan continued performing well into her 80s, including starring opposite Andy Griffith in a romantic comedy, Play The Game, that was his final film role—a performance that saw her just as game for an octogenarian sex scene with Andy Griffith as she was for the accumulated nonsense she weathered alongside the rest of the Seinfeld clan. Sheridan reportedly died of natural causes this week; per Deadline, she was 93.
Born in New York, Sheridan came up in the city’s nightclub and theater scenes—where, notably, she met and became romantically attached to a young James Dean when they both were in their 20s, recounting their romance in her 2000 book Dizzy And Jimmy. After the pair split, Sheridan spent a few years in the Caribbean as a nightclub dancer and singer, before ultimately returning to New York to pursue a career on Broadway. (Contemporaries and co-stars at the time included Meryl Streep and Christopher Lloyd.)