Bea Arthur - Definition and Overview

Beatrice Arthur as Maude Findlay on Maude.

Beatrice Arthur, as Dorothy Zbornak on The Golden Girls.

Beatrice Arthur (born Bernice Frankel on May 13, 1923), is an American actress and comedienne. Her notable television roles include the title role on the popular sitcom Maude in the 1970s and a co-starring role on The Golden Girls in the 1980s.

In the former she played Maude Findlay, an outspoken liberal living in Westchester County, New York. In the latter she played the character Dorothy Zbornak, a middle-aged woman who lived in a Florida house with two room mates (Betty White and Rue McClanahan) and Dorothy's short-tempered yet hip old mother, played by Estelle Getty.

On stage, her roles include Lucy Brown in the 1954 Off-Broadway premiere of The Threepenny Opera, Yente the Matchmaker in the 1964 premiere of Fiddler on the Roof on Broadway, and a 1966 Tony Award-winning portrayal of Vera Charles in Mame. In 1981, she appeared in Woody Allen's The Floating Lightbulb; two decades later she toured the U.S. in a one-woman show which opened in Broadway in 2002 as Bea Arthur on Broadway: Just Between Friends.

Arthur was born in New York City and grew up in the state of Maryland.

External links

• IMDb entry (http://us.imdb.com/name/nm0037735/)
• Playbill biography (http://www.playbill.com/celebritybuzz/whoswho/biography/11264.html)