Jerry Stiller

Jerry Stiller (born June 8, 1927, Brooklyn, New York, U.S.—died May 11, 2020, New York City) was an American actor and comedian best known for his role as Frank Costanza on the popular television sitcom Seinfeld. He and his wife, Anne Meara, were a successful comedy duo in the 1960s. In later years, he also acted in projects produced and directed by their son, Ben Stiller.

Early life, marriage, and Stiller and Meara

Stiller was the eldest of four children born to working-class Jewish parents in Brooklyn. His father, William Stiller, was a bus driver and the son of Galician immigrants, and his mother, Bella Stiller (née Citron), was an immigrant from Poland. While still in high school, Stiller began acting at a playhouse on Manhattan’s Lower East Side. He was inspired to act after seeing his idols, the comedians Eddie Cantor and Jimmy Durante, perform in person. After serving in the U.S. Army during World War II, Stiller studied theatre at Syracuse University under the G.I. Bill. He began working in summer stock and made his professional stage debut in 1951 in The Silver Whistle with Burgess Meredith.

In 1953 Stiller met Anne Meara, another struggling young actor, at a casting call in New York City. Meara was a tall, redheaded, Irish Roman Catholic from a middle-class family with aspirations of becoming a dramatic actress. Despite their different backgrounds, they quickly became a couple and were married that year.

By 1959 Stiller and Meara were performing with the Compass Players, a comedy improvisation group that evolved into the Second City in Chicago. Eventually, the couple developed their own comedy act and began working the national club circuit, billed as “Stiller and Meara.” Their act featured routines in which the couple played Hershey Horowitz and Mary Elizabeth Doyle, husband-and-wife characters loosely based on themselves. Soon they were comedy stars, appearing on television variety shows and game shows throughout the 1960s, including The Ed Sullivan Show, The Merv Griffin Show, and What’s My Line? They also acted together in humorous radio and television ads for products such as Blue Nun wine, Amalgamated Bank, and the Jack in the Box restaurant chain. Their daughter, Amy, was born in 1961, followed by a son, Ben, in 1965.

Stage, film, and television career

After a decade of performing together, Stiller and Meara decided to pursue separate careers. Stiller worked regularly on the stage and in film and television. In 1971 he originated the role of Launce in Two Gentlemen of Verona, playwright John Guare’s musical adaptation of William Shakespeare’s play. Stiller appeared on Broadway in the debuts of Terrence McNally’s The Ritz (1975) and David Rabe’s Hurlyburly (1984). Among his other notable stage roles were Nathan Detroit in a 1983 production of Guys and Dolls at Minneapolis’s Guthrie Theater and Dogberry in a star-studded Off-Broadway production of Shakespeare’s Much Ado About Nothing in 1988.

On television, Stiller appeared in Love, American Style, The Paul Lynde Show, The Love Boat, and L.A. Law, and his films included The Taking of Pelham One Two Three (1974), Airport 1975 (1974), and the original version of Hairspray (1988), directed by John Waters. Stiller found a new generation of fans in 1993, when he first appeared as Frank Costanza, the short-tempered, often irrational father to Jason Alexander’s perpetual loser George in Seinfeld. Although Stiller did not appear in the show until its fifth season, he soon became one of its funniest recurring characters. Among Frank’s most memorable moments were his inventions of the manssiere, a Velcro bra for men, and Festivus, an alternate winter holiday “for the rest of us.” In 1997 Stiller was nominated for an Emmy for outstanding guest actor in a comedy series for his work in Seinfeld.

Immediately after Seinfeld ended in 1998, Stiller began work in another sitcom, The King of Queens, a comedy starring Kevin James and Leah Remini as a working-class couple. Stiller played Remini’s father, Arthur Spooner, a somewhat more low-key version of his Seinfeld character. He continued to appear in roles on other shows and in films, including his son’s satirical Zoolander movies (2001 and 2016), the Will Ferrell cult classic Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy (2004), and a 2007 musical remake of Hairspray. From 2010 to 2011 he and his wife reteamed in Stiller & Meara, a Web series of two-minute comical segments produced by their son and filmed in the couple’s living room.

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Honours

Stiller’s many honours include being roasted by the New York Friars Club in 1999 and receiving the Ellis Island Medal of Honor in 2000. His autobiography, Married to Laughter: A Love Story Featuring Anne Meara, was published in 2000. He and Meara received their star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 2007, the fourth married couple to receive a joint star in the ceremony’s history. Meara died in 2015 at age 85.