Connie Sawyer

Connie Sawyer's prolific acting career stretches over 50 years and is filled with memorable performances as wisecracking grannies, tough-talking mothers, and no-nonsense neighbors. Sawyer began her long career in the '60s, appearing in minor roles on shows like the medical drama "Dr. Kildare" and films like "Ada," about a strong-willed hooker who marries a weak-willed politician. She portrayed a stern teacher in "A Hole in the Head," about a frivolous widower (Frank Sinatra) who tries to juggle business and pleasure, and was cast as a tough-talking frontier woman in the 1967 epic "The Way West." By the end of the '70s, Sawyer had become a familiar on-screen presence; she guest-starred as a cantankerous mother in the short-lived sitcom "Archie Bunker's Place," a miserly neighbor on "Mary Tyler Moore," and a disgruntled customer on the heavenly comedy "Oh, God! ." In 1989, she appeared as a gently chiding wife featured in one of the faux-documentary interviews woven throughout the critically acclaimed romantic comedy "When Harry Met Sally. .," about one couple's struggle to overcome their innate differences. She next appeared as a thieving, motorized senior citizen in the gross-out Jim Carrey comedy "Dumb & Dumber," about two insipid friends who strike out on an ill-fated cross-country road trip; after that small performance, she managed to continue her streak of notable supporting roles in the neurotic New York sitcom "Seinfeld" and the surprise stoner comedy hit "Pineapple Express."