Carla Balenda obit

Carla Balenda, Actress in ‘Sealed Cargo’ and Mickey Rooney’s ‘Hey Mulligan,’ Dies at 98

A former contract player at Columbia and RKO Pictures, she also played Timmy’s teacher on ‘Lassie’ when billed as Sally Bliss. 

She was not on the list.

Carla Balenda, who starred alongside Dana Andrews and Claude Rains in the RKO Pictures thriller Sealed Cargo and portrayed Mickey Rooney’s girlfriend on the NBC sitcom Hey Mulligan, has died. She was 98.

Balenda, billed at times as Sally Bliss, her birth name, died April 9 of natural causes at the Motion Picture & Television Country House and Hospital in Woodland Hills, her grandson Jim Martin told The Hollywood Reporter.

She also played a nurse on the 1955-56 syndicated series The Adventures of Dr. Fu Manchu, starring Glen Gordon, and recurred as Miss Hazlitt, Timmy’s (Jon Provost) teacher, on CBS’ Lassie from 1958-63.

In Sealed Cargo (1951), Balenda portrayed a woman who is aboard a fishing trawler bound for Newfoundland when she and the skipper (Andrews) wind up tangling in the North Atlantic with Nazis led by Rains’ character. She often said it was her favorite role.

When Rooney took his first crack at television, playing Mickey Mulligan — a clumsy page for a TV network who dreams of becoming a performer — on Hey Mulligan, she was his girlfriend, secretary Pat Harding. The 1954-55 series, created by Blake Edwards and Richard Quine and also known as The Mickey Rooney Show, lasted one season of 36 episodes.

The daughter of a high school science teacher, Bliss was born in Carthage, New York, on Nov. 22, 1925. She attended Baldwin High School on Long Island and acting school in Rhode Island and did summer stock.

She came to Hollywood at age 17 after signing with Columbia Pictures and appeared in such films as Swing in the Saddle (1944), Eadie Was a Lady (1945) and Rustlers of the Badlands (1945).

She got married and moved back to New York but returned to acting at RKO, where studio head Howard Hughes asked her to change her name. “He had a long list of exotic names that he chose from for his actresses,” she said in a 2013 interview.

The newly christened Carla Balenda starred with Gig Young in Hunt the Man Down (1950) and in Sealed Cargo, then worked with Elliott Reid in The Whip Hand (1951), alongside Marie Windsor in Outlaw Women (1952), opposite John Derek in Prince of Pirates (1953) and with Slim Pickens in Phantom Stallion (1954).

She went back to Bliss in 1957 and showed up on episodes of such series as The Gray Ghost, The Real McCoys, The Rebel, Perry Mason and Wagon Train before leaving acting in the 1960s, then was involved with a charity known as The Dolls.

She was married to high school sweetheart John Martin from 1944 until their 1959 divorce and to William Rutter, a publisher of law study guides, from 1965 until his 2012 death.

Survivors include her children, Paul, Joanna and Charles; 14 grandchildren; and 12 great-grandchildren.

 

Actress

Seconds (1966)

Seconds

7.6

Operating Room Nurse (uncredited)

1966

 

Jon Provost, Tommy Rettig, Lassie the Dog, and Lassie in Lassie (1954)

Lassie

6.5

TV Series

Miss Hazlit (as Sally Bliss)

1958–1963

16 episodes

 

John McIntire in Wagon Train (1957)

Wagon Train

7.5

TV Series

Martha Leeds (as Sally Bliss)

1963

1 episode

 

Raymond Burr in Perry Mason (1957)

Perry Mason

8.3

TV Series

Kay McKenzie (as Sally Bliss)

1962

1 episode

 

87th Precinct (1961)

87th Precinct

8.2

TV Series

Miss Tilson (as Sally Bliss)

1962

1 episode

 

Nick Adams in The Rebel (1959)

The Rebel

7.8

TV Series

Mary Bishop (as Sally Bliss)

1961

1 episode

 

Men Into Space (1959)

Men Into Space

7.8

TV Series

Dr. Alice Roe (as Sally Bliss)

1960

1 episode

 

Walter Brennan, Richard Crenna, and Kathleen Nolan in The Real McCoys (1957)

The Real McCoys

7.6

TV Series

Mrs. Strickland (as Sally Bliss)

1958

1 episode

 

Date with the Angels (1957)

Date with the Angels

7.0

TV Series

Vivian (as Sally Bliss)

1958

1 episode

 

The Gray Ghost (1957)

The Gray Ghost

8.4

TV Series

Christine (as Sally Bliss)

1957

1 episode

 

The Adventures of Dr. Fu Manchu (1956)

The Adventures of Dr. Fu Manchu

6.3

TV Series

Betty Leonard

1956

13 episodes

 

Matinee Theatre (1955)

Matinee Theatre

7.6

TV Series

1955

1 episode

 

The People's Choice (1955)

The People's Choice

7.9

TV Series

Jane Carter

1955

1 episode

 

The Mickey Rooney Show (1954)

The Mickey Rooney Show

7.4

TV Series

Patricia Hardy

Pat

1954–1955

22 episodes

 

Your Favorite Story (1953)

Your Favorite Story

7.9

TV Series

1954

1 episode

 

Slim Pickens, Rex Allen, Carla Balenda, and Koko in Phantom Stallion (1954)

Phantom Stallion

6.2

Claire

1954

 

Chevron Theatre (1952)

Chevron Theatre

6.5

TV Series

1953

1 episode

 

John Derek, Carla Balenda, and Barbara Rush in Prince of Pirates (1953)

Prince of Pirates

5.3

Princess Maria

1953

 

Richard Rober and Marie Windsor in Outlaw Women (1952)

Outlaw Women

5.2

Beth Larabee

1952

 

Carla Balenda, Michael St. Angel, and Bill Williams in The Pace That Thrills (1952)

The Pace That Thrills

5.6

Eve Drake

1952

 

Carla Balenda and Elliott Reid in The Whip Hand (1951)

The Whip Hand

6.0

Janet Keller

1951

 

Dana Andrews, Claude Rains, and Carla Balenda in Sealed Cargo (1951)

Sealed Cargo

6.7

Margaret McLean

1951

 

Hunt the Man Down (1950)

Hunt the Man Down

6.5

Rolene Wood

1950

 

Charles Starrett in Rustlers of the Badlands (1945)

Rustlers of the Badlands

6.6

Sally Boylston (as Sally Bliss)

1945

 

Joe Besser and Ann Miller in Eadie Was a Lady (1945)

Eadie Was a Lady

6.4

Doris (as Sally Bliss)

1945

 

Marguerite Campbell, Bob Crosby, Louise Erickson, Helen Gerald, Lynn Merrick, Toni Eden, and Kim Loo Sisters in Meet Miss Bobby Socks (1944)

Meet Miss Bobby Socks

5.6

Pillow (uncredited)

1944

 

Frederick Brady and Jeff Donnell in Dancing in Manhattan (1944)

Dancing in Manhattan

5.3

Billie (as Sally Bliss)

1944

 

Carla Balenda, Red River Dave, Carole Mathews, Jane Frazee, Jack Statham, Slim Summerville, Gil Taylor, Mary Treen, Paul Trietsch, Ken Trietsch, Jimmy Wakely, Charles Ward, Art Wenzel, Don Weston, Guinn 'Big Boy' Williams, Foy Willing, The Hoosier Hotshots, and Jimmy Wakely and His Oklahoma Cowboys in Swing in the Saddle (1944)

Swing in the Saddle

5.9

Judy Bayliss (as Sally Bliss)

1944