LOS ANGELES – Ruth Buzzi, who rose to prominence as the frumpy and bitter Gladys Ormphby on the pioneering sketch comedy series “Rowan & Martin’s Laugh-In” and made over 200 television appearances over a 45-year career, died at the age of 88.
Buzzi died Thursday at home in Texas, according to her agent, Mike Eisenstadt. She had been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s and was receiving hospice care.
Buzzi’s husband, Kent Perkins, posted a statement on her Facebook page shortly before her death, thanking her many fans and telling them: “She wants you to know she probably had more fun doing those shows than you had watching them.”
Buzzi won a Golden Globe and was nominated for two Emmys for the NBC show, which aired from 1968 until 1973. She was the only regular who appeared in all six seasons, including the pilot.
She was discovered by “Laugh-In” creator and producer George Schlatter while playing various characters on “The Steve Allen Comedy Hour.”
Schlatter was holding auditions for “Laugh-In” when he received an email with a photo of Buzzi in her Ormphby costume sitting in a wire mesh trash barrel. The character was dressed in drab brown, her bun hidden by a hairnet knotted in the center of her forehead.
“I think I hired her because of my passion for Gladys Ormphby,” he wrote in his 2023 memoir, “Still Laughing: A Life in Comedy.” “I must admit that the hairnet and rolled-down stockings fueled my fire. My favorite Gladys line was when she announced that she had been sent home early on the day of the office Christmas party.
Gladys used her purse as a weapon against those who bothered her, striking them on the head. Tyrone F. Horneigh, Arte Johnson’s dirty old man character on “Laugh-In,” was her most frequent target.
“Gladys embodies the overlooked, the downtrodden, the taken for granted, the struggler,” Buzzi told The Connecticut Post in 2018. “So when she fights back, she represents everyone who has been marginalized, reduced to a sex object, or otherwise abused. And that applies to almost everyone at some point.
Buzzi performed her act at the Dean Martin Celebrity Roasts in Las Vegas, where she smashed her purse against the heads of Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, and Lucille Ball, among others.
Her other recurring characters on “Laugh-In” included Flicker Farkle, Busy-Buzzi, a Hollywood gossip columnist; Doris Swizzler, a cocktail-lounge regular who got drunk with husband Leonard (Dick Martin); and an inconsiderate flight attendant.
Buzzi told The Connecticut Post, “I never took my work for granted, nor did I believe I deserved more credit, spotlight, or pay than anyone else.” “I was just thrilled to drive down the hill to NBC every day as an employed actor with a job to do.”
Buzzi has remained friends with “Laugh-In” co-stars Lily Tomlin and Jo Anne Worley over the years.
Ruth Ann Buzzi was born on July 24, 1936, in Westerly, Rhode Island, and was the daughter of Angelo Buzzi, a well-known stone sculptor. Her father, and later her brother, owned Buzzi Memorials, a gravestone and monument company in Stonington, Connecticut, where she was the head cheerleader during high school.
Buzzi enrolled in the Pasadena Playhouse at the age of seventeen. During her summer vacation two years later, she toured with singer Rudy Vallee in a musical and comedy show. She earned an Actors’ Equity union card before graduating from the playhouse’s College of Theatre Arts.
Buzzi moved to New York and was immediately cast as the lead in an off-Broadway musical revue, the first of 19 such performances on the East Coast.
Her national television debut came on “The Garry Moore Show” in 1964, shortly after Carol Burnett was replaced by Dorothy Loudon on the show. She played Shakundala the Silent, Dominic the Great’s assistant who is a bumbling magician.
Buzzi was a regular on the CBS variety show “The Entertainers,” hosted by Burnett and Bob Newhart.
She appeared in the original Broadway cast of “Sweet Charity” with Gwen Verdon in 1966.
Buzzi traveled the country with her nightclub act, including stops in Las Vegas.
She was a semi-recurring character on “That Girl” as Marlo Thomas’ friend. In the mid-1970s, she co-starred with Jim Nabors as time-traveling androids in “The Lost Saucer”.
Her other guest appearances included shows hosted by Burnett, Flip Wilson, Glen Campbell, Tony Orlando, Donny and Marie Osmond, and Leslie Uggams.
She appeared in Ball’s final comedy series, “Life With Lucy.”
Buzzi appeared in music videos with “Weird Al” Yankovic, the B-52s, and Presidents of the United States of America.
She performed hundreds of guest voices in cartoon series such as “Pound Puppies,” “Berenstain Bears,” “The Smurfs,” and “The Angry Beavers.”
She received an Emmy nomination for her six-year run as shopkeeper Ruthie on “Sesame Street.”
Her filmography includes “Freaky Friday,” “Chu Chu and the Philly Flash,” “The North Avenue Irregulars,” and “The Apple Dumpling Gang Rides Again.”
Buzzi was active on social media and had thousands of followers, whom she rewarded with one-liners like “I have never faked sarcasm” and “Scientists say the universe is made entirely of neurons, protons, and electrons.” “They appear to have missed morons.”
She married actor Kent Perkins in 1978.
The couple relocated from California to Texas in 2003, purchasing a 640-acre ranch near Stephenville.
Buzzi retired from acting in 2021 and suffered several strokes the following year. Her husband informed The Dallas Morning News in 2023 that she had dementia.
