Ann Wedgeworth

Ann Wedgeworth (born January 21, 1935) is a Tony award winning American actress, best known for her role as Lahoma Vane Lucas on the daytime dramas Another World (1967–1970) and Somerset (1970–1973). Ann attended the University of Texas and was a childhood friend and high school classmate of Jayne Mansfield.

Ann Wedgeworth Career

Three's Company

Ann joined the cast of Three's Company in 1979 as Lana Shields and was promptly written out of the series in mid-season with no explanation given in the story for Lana's disappearance.

Wedgeworth revealed to author Chris Mann that she wasn't "fired" but asked to be let go. After shooting a couple of episodes of Three's Company, Wedgeworth said some of the cast members were complaining about the size of her role. She said afterwards, her part dwindled down to practically "nothing". Wedgeworth asked the producers to write the part of Lana back to the way it was intended and promised to be, or else release her from the show so she could pursue other opportunities. The producers thereupon released her from the show.

Other works

In 1973 she had a supporting role as Frenchy in the film Scarecrow. In 1978, she won a Tony Award for Best Supporting Actress in Neil Simon's Chapter Two.

She also had a role on the sitcom Evening Shade, as well as a walk-on role on Roseanne where she played Dan Conner's mother. In 1982, she worked with Linda Bloodworth-Thomason in her first series, Filthy Rich, playing ditsy, good-natured Bootsie Westchester. In 1986 she had a memorable role as a nasty toy store saleswoman in an episode of The Twilight Zone.

Throughout the 1980s, Wedgworth took many supporting roles in films. She played Patsy Cline's feisty mother, Hilda Hensley, in the 1985 biopic Sweet Dreams. Also in 1985, Wedgeworth appeared in the TV movie Right to Kill?. In 1987 she appeared as a mother who is unknowingly reunited with her dead son in Made in Heaven, and she appeared in A Tiger's Tale that same year. In 1989 she portrayed Aunt Fern in the box office hit Steel Magnolias, directed by her friend Herbert Ross, who also directed her in her Tony-winning role in Chapter Two. She also appeared in the 1991 film Hard Promises.

Most recently, Wedgeworth was seen in The Hawk Is Dying, with Paul Giamatti, shown at the Sundance Film Festival.

Personal life

Ann was married to veteran actor Rip Torn in 1955 to 1961. They have a daughter, actress Danae Torn, born in 1967. In 1970 she married acting teacher and director Ernie Martin, and they have a daughter, actress/acting teacher/writer Dianna Martin.