Pert Kelton

Biography: Born into a vaudeville family, Pert Kelton was a seasoned performer by the time she entered her teens. In 1925, she made her Broadway debut in Sally, playing the sort of brash "soubrette" role that would become her stock in trade. In films from 1929, she scored a major success as Trixie Odbray in The Bowery (1933), showing up periodically to comment musically on the proceedings. Briefly signed by Hal Roach in 1935, she co-starred with Patsy Kelly in a brace of two-reel comedies and in the seven-reel feature Kelly the Second (1936). On a more dramatic note, she played a blowsy stool pigeon in Mary Burns, Fugitive (1935) and was briefly seen as a philosophical hooker in Capra's You Can't Take It With You (1936). From 1939 to 1949 she confined her activities to the stage, then was hired by the DuMont Television network to appear opposite Jackie Gleason on Cavalcade of Stars. During her two-year stint on this series, she created the role of long-suffering Brooklyn housewife AliceBorn into a vaudeville family, Pert Kelton was a seasoned performer by the time she entered her teens. In 1925, she made her Broadway debut in Sally, playing the sort of brash "soubrette" role that would become her stock in trade. In films from 1929, she scored a major success as Trixie Odbray in The Bowery (1933), showing up periodically to comment musically on the proceedings. Briefly signed by Hal Roach in 1935, she co-starred with Patsy Kelly in a brace of two-reel comedies and in the seven-reel feature Kelly the Second (1936). On a more dramatic note, she played a blowsy stool pigeon in Mary Burns, Fugitive (1935) and was briefly seen as a philosophical hooker in Capra's You Can't Take It With You (1936). From 1939 to 1949 she confined her activities to the stage, then was hired by the DuMont Television network to appear opposite Jackie Gleason on Cavalcade of Stars. During her two-year stint on this series, she created the role of long-suffering Brooklyn housewife Alice Kramden in Gleason's Honeymooners sketches. When Gleason moved to CBS in 1952, Kelton was replaced by Audrey Meadows. According to CBS, Kelton had retired from TV due to failing health; the truth was that the network blacklisted her after her name appeared in the pages of Red Channels. Returning to Broadway, she made a triumphant comeback in 1957 as Mrs. Paroo in the smash Broadway musical The Music Man, repeating the role in the 1962 film version. In the 1960s, Pert Kelton was welcomed back to television in a series of kitchen detergent advertisements; and in 1967, the year before her death, she was reunited with Jackie Gleason in an hour-long Honeymooners sketch -- this time as Ralph Kramden's mother-in-law.… Expand