Maudie Prickett was an American character actress who performed in over 300 stage, film, and television productions during a career that spanned nearly four decades.
Career
Born in Portland, Oregon, Prickett often portrayed maids, secretaries, busybodies, spinsters, and nosy neighbors. She made 36 appearances on the television series Hazel starring Shirley Booth. On that sitcom she was cast in the recurring role of Rosie, a maid and friend of the title character. One of Prickett's notable film portrayals is as a maid named Elsie at the Plaza Hotel in New York City in Alfred Hitchcock's North by Northwest in 1959. Prickett was also cast in the 1950s Western series The Adventures of Kit Carson and 26 Men. She portrays Miss Tazey, Lois Lane's nurse, in a 1952 episode of the Adventures of Superman starring George Reeves and Phyllis Coates. Some of her other television credits include nine appearances as Ms. Gordon on CBS's The Jack Benny Program. She plays a secretary, Miss Sanders, to the Howard McNear's character, Wilbur Wilgus, on a 1959 episode of the ABC sitcom The Donna Reed Show. Prickett also portrays Alice MacAvity in a 1954 installment of the NBC sitcom It's a Great Life, featuring Frances Bavier. She guest-stars too in the 1957-1958 NBC sitcom Sally, starring Joan Caulfield, and on CBS's Dennis the Menace, with Jay North. She appears as a dentist's secretary in the episode "The Dentist" on another CBS sitcom, Angel, starring Annie Fargé. Prickett appears in the 1962 short-lived ABC/Warner Bros. sitcom Room for One More, starring Andrew Duggan. In another short-lived series of the 1960s, The Tammy Grimes Show, she is a regular character. Prickett can also be seen in several episodes of The Andy Griffith Show as Mrs. Edna Larch and Aunt Nora, as well as in the role of Myrtle on Mayberry R.F.D.. On the comedy series Get Smart, she plays Maxwell Smart's Aunt Bertha in the 1965 episode "My Nephew the Spy". She appears too as a landlord on a 1970 episode of the police dramaDragnet and as various characters in five episodes of the sitcom Bewitched. Among her final television performances are her 1974 roles as Mabel on the CBS series Dirty Sally and as Mrs. Chandler on McMillan & Wife.
Personal life
Maudie was married three times; all three of her husbands predeceased her. Her first marriage was in 1941 to Charles Fillmore Prickett II, the co-founder and general manager of the Pasadena Playhouse, with whom she had two children: Charles Fillmore Prickett III, who became an orthopedic surgeon, and a daughter, Charie Doyle Prickett,. In 1961, seven years after the death of her first husband, she married Dr. Eakle W. Cartwright, a physician, who died the following year. Maudie's final marriage was to Cyril Bernard Cooper, who served as mayor of Pasadena from 1968 to 1970.
