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Mary Grace Canfield dies at 89


Brock

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R.I.P. to Ralph, the last of the Monroe "Brothers", and one of Hollywood's most unique character actresses. :( :( :(

 

 


Mary Grace Canfield, a veteran character actress who played handywoman Ralph Monroe on the television show "Green Acres," has died. She was 89.

Her daughter, Phoebe Alexiades, says Canfield died of lung cancer on Saturday at a hospice in the California coastal town of Santa Barbara.

Canfield had appearances on a number of TV shows during a four-decade career, including "General Hospital" and "The Hathaways." She was Harriet Kravitz on four episodes of the 1960s series "Bewitched."

But she was best known for her role of Ralph Monroe in some 40 episodes of "Green Acres," which ran from 1965 to 1971.

Monroe greeted folks in the town of Hootersville with a cheery "howdy doody," wore painters' overalls and was forever working on the Douglas family's bedroom with her brother, Alf.

 

ABC News: http://abcnews.go.com/Entertainment/t/story/green-acres-actress-mary-grace-canfield-dies-22557693

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XDKVOH0l8Cs

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Not realizing at the time that Alice Pearce had died, it was strange to see Mary Grace show up on Bewitched as "Miss Kravitz", Abner's sister.  In retrospect, she was quite good with her confused contorted face doing the role in her own style.  Though I missed Alice, keeping Mary Grace on probably would have been better than Sandra Gould who did an Alice impression and suffered by comparison.  Sandra probably would have been OK if she hadn't been stacked up against Alice.

 

Mary Grace is one of the few character actresses from that era that never worked with Lucy---unless I'm forgetting one.

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Sometimes I wish she was kept on Bewitched as Harriet Kravitz, instead of bringing on Mrs. Kravitz # 2, but then we wouldn't have had Ralph Monroe!!!  rip MG.

 

She could have continued the role of Harriet Kravitz as a recurring one on Bewitched. Her part on Green Acres wasn't that big of a role as she only appeared on that show when needed. Her Green Acres cast mate, Frank Candy, was able to pull "double duty" as he played the role of Sam Drucker in both Green Acres and Petticoat Junction simultaneously. There was even one year where he appeared on a recurring basis in The Beverly Hillbillies

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Was sad when seeing it on the news this morning, loved her and her character on Green Acres.  Sad that almost no one survives that series, I just knew that Eb would be the only one as he was much younger than the others.  Remember her also on Bewitched, sad that she never worked with Lucy, she was great.

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She could have continued the role of Harriet Kravitz as a recurring one on Bewitched. Her part on Green Acres wasn't that big of a role as she only appeared on that show when needed. Her Green Acres cast mate, Frank Candy, was able to pull "double duty" as he played the role of Sam Drucker in both Green Acres and Petticoat Junction simultaneously. There was even one year where he appeared on a recurring basis in The Beverly Hillbillies

Cady wasn't the only one who pulled double duty but remember, it wasn't that difficult since all those shows were produced by Paul Henning, shot at the same studio and schedules could be juggled more easily, it's not like he was working for one show/production company studio on one location on one side of town and then had to be shuttled over to another.... quite a different story! :lucywow:

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