Barbara Perry obit

Barbara Perry, Actress on 'The Dick Van Dyke Show,' Dies at 97

She was not on the list.

She also appeared on 'The Andy Griffith Show,' 'Murphy Brown' and 'Baskets' and was an expert tap dancer who headlined nightclubs.

Barbara Perry, an actress and dancer who played the wife of Morey Amsterdam's character on The Dick Van Dyke Show, died Sunday of natural causes in Hollywood, family spokesman David Van Deusen said. She was 97.

Perry also worked on the Samuel Fuller films Shock Corridor (1963) and The Naked Kiss (1964), starred on Broadway with Burgess Meredith and Eddie Foy Jr. and had dozens of TV appearances, including several in the past decade. She played the neighbor Mrs. Douglas on two episodes of How I Met Your Mother and was a gift shop employee on a 2017 installment of Baskets.

On the 1963 "Class Reunion" episode of The Andy Griffith Show, Perry appears as Mayberry local Mary Lee Becktel, and she, Andy and Barney (Don Knotts) — all members of the Class of '45 — wistfully sing the Mayberry Union High fight song. ("We'll hit the line for points every time, the Orange and Blue will try, try, try, try …")

Dick Van Dyke Show trivia buffs will know Perry as "Pickles," the wife of joke writer Buddy Sorrell (Amsterdam), on two first-season episodes of the famed sitcom. (Joan Shawlee took over the role for three installments in 1963.)

And she was one of Murphy Brown's secretaries — No. 39, in fact — on the Candice Bergen comedy.

Perry was born on June 22, 1921, in Norfolk, Virginia. Her father, William, was a keyboardist and a conductor, and her mother, Victoria, sang in the chorus at the Metropolitan Opera in New York. At the age of 4, she made her stage debut as Trouble in Madame Butterfly at the Met.

Her mom brought her to Hollywood and opened Perry’s Studios, where her daughter studied dance and performed at the Hollywood Bowl in the 1930s for choreographers Michio Ito and Agnes de Mille.

Tap was a specialty, and Perry went on to headline at nightclubs including the Hotel Nacional de Cuba, the Chez Paris in Chicago, the Cocoanut Grove in Los Angeles and the Café de Paris in London, opening for the likes of Lena Horne and Peggy Lee.

She made her film debut in William Wyler's Counsellor at Law (1933), starring John Barrymore, and then appeared in The Mystery of Edwin Drood (1935), starring Claude Rains.

On Broadway, Perry starred with Meredith in Happy as Larry in 1950 and danced with Foy in Rumple (Elliott Gould was in the chorus) in 1957. She also studied acting at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in London.

Her credits also included the films Tap (1989), Father of the Bride (1991), Just Write (1997), Mr. Woodcock (2007) and The Back-up Plan (2010) and such TV shows as The Hathaways, The Donna Reed Show, Bewitched, My Three Sons, Barnaby Jones, St. Elsewhere and Newhart.

Perry also wrote and performed in a one-woman show titled Passionate Ladies, which won two Los Angeles Drama Critics Circle Awards. And in October, she received the Founders Award from SAG-AFTRA.

Her second husband was animator Art Babbitt, who developed the character of Goofy and worked on such Disney classics as Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937) and Fantasia (1940). They were married from 1967 until his death in 1992. (His first wife was dancer Marge Champion.)

Survivors include her daughter, Laurel Lee, granddaughter Audrey Lee and stepdaughters Karin and Michele.

Film

Year       Film       Role       Notes

1933      Counsellor at Law             Dorothy Dwight               

1935      The Mystery of Edwin Drood       Schoolgirl            Uncredited

1944      Hi, Beautiful       Specialty dancer               Uncredited

1945      An Angel Comes to Brooklyn       Barbara               

1949      I Was a Male War Bride Tall WAC             

1960      From the Terrace             Blonde Uncredited

1962      Period of Adjustment     Cherylynn Anderson       Uncredited

1963      Shock Corridor                  Uncredited

1964      The Naked Kiss Edna     

1965      Mirage Dr. Broden's Receptionist             Uncredited

1971      Thief      Mrs. Risman       Television film

1973      Tom       Jim's Mother     

1978      Operation Room                               Television film

1980      Marilyn: The Untold Story                             Television film

1983      I Take These Men             Professor Ann Bromfield               Television film

1984      Trancers               Mrs. Santa Claus              

1989      Trust Me              Severe Woman

1989      Tap         Milly     

1989      Wedding Band   Margot

1990      Polly Comin' Home!         Mrs. Clayton      

1991      Father of the Bride          Female Factory Worker

1993      Double Deception            Lil Paxton            

1997      Just Write            Mildred               

2007      Mr. Woodcock   Old Woman       

2010      The Back-up Plan              Wedding Singer               

2011      Let Go   Sweet Old Lady

2012      The Tango Singer              Bertha Gardes  

2015      Everybody Does It            Grandma            

2017      The Extra             Herself

Television

Year       Title       Role       Notes

1948      Rooftop Rendezvous      Herself Season 1, Ep. 5

1955      The Pepsi-Cola Playhouse             Herself 1 episode

1957      The Ed Sullivan Show      Herself Season 11, Ep. 12

1959      The Thin Man     Binky     1 episode

1959      The Life and Legend of Wyatt Earp            Phronsie LaTour                1 episode

1960      The Twilight Zone             Blonde Woman Episode: The Chaser

1960      The Jim Backus Show      Lollypop               1 episode

1960      The Donna Reed Show   Buffie    Season 1 - Episode 6

1961      Thriller Babs Dawson     1 episode

1961-1962          The Dick Van Dyke Show               Pickles Sorrell    2 episodes

1961-1962          The Hathaways Thelma Brockwood / Thelma Blackwood                6 episodes

1962      Pete and Gladys                Betty / Carol       2 episodes

1963      The Joey Bishop Show    Shopper               Episode: Two Little Maids Are We

1963-1966          The Andy Griffith Show Floss / Doris Williams / Lavinia / Mary Lee Becktel             4 episodes

1964-1972          My Three Sons Mrs. Thompson / Mrs. Hoover    3 episodes

1964      The Fugitive        Woman in hall   Episode: Rat in a Corner

1964      The Farmer's Daughter Connie Episode: The Turkish Delight

1964      Arrest and Trial Clara      Episode: Those Which Love Has Made

1964      The Cara Williams Show                Miss Bertrand    Episode: The Wedding Rehearsal

1965      My Favorite Martian       Miss Hotchkiss   Episode: Martin of the Movies

1965-1966          Perry Mason       Girl Assistant / Beauty Operator                2 episodes

1966      The Lucy Show Blonde Customer / The Housewife           2 episodes

1966      Family Affair       Bess Melville      Episode: Buffy

1966      Daniel Boone     Lydia Dorsey       Episode: The Loser's Race

1967      Gomer Pyle, U.S.M.C.     Den Mother        Episode: Gomer, the Good Samaritan

1968      Bewitched           Mrs. Bentley / Mrs. MacLane      2 episodes

1970      Room 222            Pearl      Episode: The Whole World Can Hear You

1970      The Bill Cosby Show        Mrs. Perry           Episode: Open House

1971      Adam-12              Wilma Engles     Episode: Log 26: LEMRAS

1973      Needles and Pins              Mrs. Martindale                Episode: It Was a Very Good Line

1975      Joe and Sons      Theresa                Episode: Joe's Date

1980      Barnaby Jones   Mitzi      Episode: The Final Victim

1982      Trapper John, M.D.          Registrar              Episode: Doctors and Other Strangers

1982      Benson Mary Colton       Episode: Mary and Her Lambs

1983      St. Elsewhere     Dietician              Episode: Rain

1984      The Duck Factory              Aunt Pauline      Episode: The Annies

1984      Newhart              Tourist Episode: Tickets, Please

1989      Quantum Leap Theora Beaman                Episode: Good Morning, Peoria 

1989      The Magical World of Disney       Woman                Episode: Polly

1989      Dallas    Ms. Perkins         Episode: Sex, Lies and Videotape

1989      Murder, She Wrote         Party Guest        Episode: Town Father

1990      Murphy Brown    Secretary #39     Episode: The Last Laugh

1992      Parker Lewis Can't Lose Auntie Em           Episode: Civil Wars

1992      Married... with Children                Old Lady               Episode: Psychic Avengers

1997      Alright Already Lillian    Episode: Again with the Funeral

2000      Beyond Belief: Fact or Fiction                      1 episode

2003      The Guardian     Woman                Episode: Carnival

2009      The Unit               Old Woman        Episode: The Last Nazi

2009-2014          How I Met Your Mother                Mrs. Douglas      2 episodes

2011      Perfect Couples                Aunt Bertha        Episode: Perfect Wedding

2013      Work It Elderly Woman #1           Episode: My So-Called Mid-Life Crisis

2014      Review                 Episode: Making a Sex Tape; Being a Racist; Hunting

2017      Baskets                 Gift Shop Employee        Episode: Ronald Reagan Library