Adrienne Barbeau
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Biography
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Biography
Pretty, buxom, brunette player of stage and screen who may be best known as Carol Trener, divorced daughter of Bea Arthur on "Maude" (CBS, 1972-78), Norman Lear's groundbreaking sitcom. While the role provided high visibility, Barbeau had little to do on the series. It, however, opened the door to a slew of TV-movies, specials, and guest spots beginning in the mid-1970s and continuing through the 90s. Barbeau has also had a modest feature career, generally in fairly savvy and thrifty genre fare.
Barbeau first gained notice on the Broadway stage in an early 1970s revival of "Fiddler on the Roof" and garnered a Tony nomination and Theater World Award for her performance as Rizzo in "Grease" (1971). The success of "Maude" led to such TV-movie credits as co-starring with Desi Arnaz, Jr. in the medical drama "Having Babies" (her TV-movie debut, 1976), and "Someone's Watching Me" (1978), a nifty thriller (the first of several collaborations) helmed by John Carpenter (whom she married in 1979 and later divorced), Barbeau gradually evolved from playing ingenues to mothers and worldly older woman in later TV movies including the western "Blood River" (1991) starring Rick Schroeder and written by Carpenter, and the remake of "Jailbreakers" (1994), part of Showtime's "Rebel Highway" series.
Barbeau has done her most enjoyable feature work in collaboration with Carpenter ("The Fog" 1980; "Escape From New York" 1981) and horror auteur George Romero ("Creepshow" 1982; "Two Evil Eyes" 1990). Whereas Carpenter envisioned her as a hard-boiled leading lady who comfortably packs a rod, Romero got much mileage from her campy turns playing hard-eyed harpies.
Filmography
Cast (Feature Film)
Cast (Special)
Cast (TV Mini-Series)
Life Events
1972
Made TV debut as the daughter of Bea Arthur's title character on the comedy series "Maude" (CBS)
1972
Received a Tony Award nomination playing tough-girl Rizzo in the Broadway production of "Grease"
1976
TV-movie debut, "Having Babies"
1980
Made feature film debut in her then-husband, director John Carpenter's horror film, "The Fog"
1981
Featured in the campy, slapstick comedy "The Cannonball Run"
1981
Again teamed with then-husband John Carpenter for "Escape from New York"
1982
Played Hal Holbrook's emotionally abusive wife in one of five short stories in the anthology horror movie "Creepshow"; written by Stephen King and directed by George A. Romero
1982
Starred in the horror film "Swamp Thing"; written and directed by Wes Craven
1986
Cast in a small role as Rodney Dangerfield's wife in the comedy "Back to School"
1989
Starred in low-budget spoof "Cannibal Women in the Avocado Jungle of Death"; co-starred Bill Maher
1992
Lent her voice to Catwoman on "Batman: The Animated Series" (FOX)
1998
Played Oswald's mother on the ABC comedy "The Drew Carey Show"
1998
Released her debut album as a folk singer, the self-titled <i>Adrienne Barbeau</i>
2002
Voiced the villieness Helga Von Guggen in the cartoon series "Totally Spies!"
2003
Cast as Ruthie on the HBO series "Carnivàle"
2006
Published autobiography <i>There Are Worse Things I Could Do</i>
2006
Starred as Judy Garland in the Off-Broadway play "The Property Known as Garland"
2008
Voiced Scooters Mom in the animated feature "Fly Me to the Moon"
2008
Published first novel, <i>Vampyres of Hollywood</i>; co-written by Michael Scott
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