PENNY MARSHALL Biography - Theater, Opera and Movie personalities

 
 

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PENNY MARSHALL

Name: Penny Marshall                                                                       
Birth name: Carole Penny Marshall                                                         
Born: 15 October 1942 Bronx, New York                                                     
                                                                                           
Penny Marshall (born October 15, 1942) is an American Golden Globe-nominated               
actress, producer and director. She was the first woman to direct two films that           
grossed over $100 million each (Big and A League of Their Own).                           
                                                                                           
Marshall was born Carole Penny Marshall in The Bronx, New York City, the                   
daughter of Marjorie Irene (née Ward), a tap dance teacher who ran a tap dance           
school, and Anthony Wallace Marshall, a director of industrial films and later a           
producer. She is the sister of actor/director/TV producer Garry Marshall and               
Ronny Hallin, a TV producer. Her father was of Italian descent, his family                 
having come from Abruzzo, and her mother was of English and Scottish descent;             
her father changed his last name from "Marscharelli" to "Marshall" before Penny           
was born. She is a graduate of Walton High School in New York City and                     
attended the University of New Mexico.                                                     
                                                                                           
Marshall first gained prominence as a television actress with a recurring guest           
role on The Odd Couple from 1971 - 1975. She then played the role of the wise-cracking     
brewery worker Laverne De Fazio in the popular TV sitcom Laverne and Shirley               
from 1976 - 1983. While on Laverne and Shirley, she made two guest star                   
appearances on Mary Tyler Moore as Mary's neighbor in her new apartment building,         
Paula Kovacks.                                                                             
                                                                                           
She has directed several successful feature motion pictures since the mid-1980s,           
including Big (first film directed by a woman to gross over USD $100 million),             
Awakenings starring Robin Williams and Robert De Niro, and A League of Their Own,         
which starred Geena Davis, Tom Hanks, Madonna and Rosie O'Donnell. She has also           
lent her voice to the evil nanny on the first produced episode of The Simpsons,           
Ms. Botz, and played a cameo role as herself in HBO's hit series Entourage.               
                                                                                           
In April 2007, it was announced that Marshall would reunite with her Laverne &             
Shirley co-star Cindy Williams for a TV Land network reality series in which the           
ladies would play themselves and live in Marshall's house, where the show would           
be filmed.