Carole Penny Marshall is an American actress, television producer, film producer, television
director, and film director.
After playing several small roles for television, she was cast as Laverne DeFazio on the sitcom
Laverne & Shirley, which ran from 1976 until 1983, during which Marshall was nominated
for a Golden Globe award for her performance three times.
She progressed to directing films such as Big, the first film directed by a woman to
gross in excess of $100 million at the U.S. box office; Awakenings, which was nominated
for an Academy Award for Best Picture; and A League of Their Own.
She produced Cinderella Man and Bewitched, as well as episodes of According to Jim.
She recently directed two episodes of the Showtime series United States of Tara.
Early life Carole Penny Marshall was born in New City,
New York, in 1943, to Marjorie Irene, a tap dance teacher who ran the Marjorie Marshall
Dance School, and Anthony "Tony" Masciarelli, later Marshall, a director of industrial films
and later a producer.
She is the sister of actorTV producer Garry Marshall and Ronny Hallin, a television producer.
Her birth name Carole was selected because her mother's favorite actress was Carole Lombard.
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 Masciarelli to
Marshall before Penny was born.
Religion played no role in the Marshall children's lives.
Garry Marshall was christened Episcopalian, Ronny was Lutheran, and Penny was confirmed
in a Congregational Church, because "... [M]other sent us anyplace that had a hall where she
could put on a recital.
If she hadn't needed performance space, we wouldn't have bothered."
She grew up at 3235 Grand Concourse, the Bronx, a street that also spawned Neil Simon, Paddy
Chayefsky, Calvin Klein, and Ralph Lauren.
She began her career as a tap dancer at age three, and later taught tap at her mother's
dance school.
She graduated from Walton High School and attended the University of New Mexico.
In 1967, she moved to Los Angeles to join her older brother Garry Marshall, a writer
whose credits at the time included TV's The Dick Van Dyke Show.
Career One of her first jobs was for a TV commercial
for a beautifying shampoo.
She was hired to play a girl with stringy, unattractive hair, and Farrah Fawcett was
hired to play a girl with thick, bouncy hair.
As the crew was lighting the set, Marshall's stand-in wore a placard that read "Homely
Girl" and Fawcett's stand-in wore a placard that said "Pretty Girl".
Farrah Fawcett, sensing Marshall's insecurity about her looks, crossed out "Homely" on the
Marshall stand-in placard and wrote "Plain".
She and another actress Billie Hayes were the only two auditioned for the role of Witchiepoo
for H.R.
Pufnstuf, produced by Sid and Marty Krofft.
Marshall thought that she wasn't right for the part.
Hayes got the role.
Marshall first gained prominence as a television actress with a recurring guest role of Myrna
Turner on The Odd Couple.
In Marshall's ultimate appearance as Myrna Turner, Myrna married her boyfriend, Sheldn,
played by her then-real-life husband, Rob Reiner, and briefly introduced her brother
and sister, Werner Turner and Verna Turner.
Before appearing on The Odd Couple, Marshall was considered to play the role of Gloria
Bunker Stivic on All in the Family.
She ultimately lost the part to Sally Struthers while her husband, Rob Reiner, was cast as
Gloria's husband, Michael "Meathead" Stivic.
In 1974, James L. Brooks and Allan Burns, executive producers of the hit situation comedy,
The Mary Tyler Moore Show, cast Marshall as Janice Dreyfuss, sister-in-law to Paul Dreyfuss
in the series, Paul Sand in Friends and Lovers.
It aired on CBS-TV Saturday nights beginning September 14, 1974, as part of the powerhouse
lineup of All in the Family, The Mary Tyler Moore Show, The Bob Newhart Show, and The
Carol Burnett Show.
Despite good reviews and decent ratings, it was canceled mid-season.
Brooks and Burns, along with studio head Grant Tinker were so impressed with Marshall's comedic
talent that the following season, they hired Marshall and actress Mary Kay Place to play
Mary Richards' new neighbors on The Mary Tyler Moore Show, after Mary moved into her new
apartment in a high-rise.
Then Garry Marshall, creator/part-time writer for Happy Days, cast his sister, Penny, and
Cindy Williams to guest on an episode of that show.
The installment, titled "A Date with Fonzie", aired on November 11, 1975 and introduced
the characters LaVerne DeFazio and Shirley Feeney.
In that episode, Laverne and Shirley were a pair of wise-cracking brewery workers, who
were dates for Fonzie and Richie.
The pair were such a hit with the studio audience that Garry Marshall decided to co-create and
star them in a hit spin-off, Laverne and Shirley.
The characters of Laverne and Shirley also appeared in five more episodes of Happy Days.
In 1983, while still filming Laverne and Shirley, Marshall guest-starred on Taxi in a cameo
appearance as herself.
In the Taxi episode "Louie Moves Uptown", Marshall is turned down for residency in a
new high-rise condo in Manhattan.
The Laverne and Shirley episode "Lost in Spacesuits" is referenced in the scene.
At the encouragement of her brother, Marshall became interested in directing.
She directed four episodes of Laverne and Shirley and other TV assignments.
She soon moved on to theatrical films, her first film being Jumpin' Jack Flash starring
Whoopi Goldberg.
Marshall has directed several successful feature films since the mid-1980s, including 1988's
Big starring Tom Hanks, Awakenings starring Robin Williams and Robert De Niro, A League
of Their Own with Geena Davis, Tom Hanks, Madonna and Rosie O'Donnell, and The Preacher's
Wife starring Denzel Washington and Whitney Houston.
In 1991, she was awarded the Women in Film Crystal Award.
She lent her voice to Ms. Botz aa Ms. Botzukowski, the "babysitter bandit", on the first produced
episode of The Simpsons, and played a cameo role as herself on the HBO series Entourage.
She also made a cameo appearance alongside her brother Gary Marshall in the movie Hocus
Pocus.
She was reunited with her Laverne & Shirley co-star Cindy Williams on a November 2013
episode of Sam & Cat.
Personal life While attending the University of New Mexico
in Albuquerque, Marshall met Michael Henry, a football player.
She left college to marry him in 1961; they had a daughter, Tracy.
Marshall worked as a secretary and later as a tap dance teacher.
The marriage lasted 3 years.
On April 10, 1971, Marshall married actor/director Rob Reiner, and her daughter took the name
Tracy Reiner.
Her marriage to Reiner lasted until 1981.
Filmography
References
External links Penny Marshall at the Internet Movie Database
Penny Marshall at the Internet Off-Broadway Database