The Amazing Life Of Everybody Loves Raymond Star Doris Roberts

From June Cleaver to Marge Simpson, television fans have always fallen in love with sitcom matriarchs. Even though Doris Roberts' "Everybody Loves Raymond" character Marie Barone was meant to be an antagonist of sorts — the overbearing mother-in-law that many woman fear they'll inherit — fans nevertheless fell in love with the actor behind the character. Across her decades-long career in entertainment, Roberts won fans in a wide variety of projects. From the action-comedy detective series "Remington Steele" to the snowy shenanigans of "National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation," Roberts could always be counted on for a laugh ... and often in the same project, she'd make you feel something. 

That was the thing about Marie on "Everybody Loves Raymond," after all — her over-the-top protectiveness of her adult son came from a deep, abiding love, and you could tell. "I love to be able to make you laugh and cry in the same sentence. I'm blessed that I'm doing what I do. Just blessed," she told Reverend Hollywood in 2014. "I can't think of anything that would give me the joy that I have from acting." Sadly, Roberts died in 2016, but her legacy lives on. The amazing life of Doris Roberts is worth looking back on, so read on for a peek into the life of a woman who entertained millions of people across her decades in the public eye.

Doris Roberts was born in 1925, and it wasn't long before she discovered a love of acting. Speaking with Smashing Interviews Magazine, Roberts recalled an early experience that showed her how much she loved to entertain a crowd. "When I was in kindergarten, I had a line in a little play," she said, "and the line was, 'I am Patrick Potato, and this is my cousin, Mrs. Tomato.'" Even though she was a child, she brought down the house. "I heard laughter, and that's when the acting bug bit me."

Roberts was soon living and working in New York City, where she studied at the famous Actor's Studio. Classmates included James Dean and Marilyn Monroe, and the truth was that Roberts found her more famous contemporary to be a great actor. Monroe would sit there "in a coat, with her collar up and a scarf over her head," Roberts told The Columbus Dispatch. "She would get up and do a scene, and she was wonderful. She was a scared little bird." While Dean and Monroe would both die young, Roberts would outlive her contemporaries by many decades. In fact, her own career wouldn't even really get started until after they were gone.

When she was younger, Doris Roberts debuted on Broadway in a 1955 production of "The Time Of Your Life." It wasn't a bad way to be introduced to the professional acting world; after all, Roberts co-starred with a stellar cast. "It was astounding," she told Reverend Hollywood, running through a list of the people she shared the stage with: Carol Marcus, Harold Lang, and even CNN anchor Anderson Cooper's mother, Gloria Vanderbilt. 

Roberts didn't have a huge part; Broadway.com credits her as "The Streetwalker's Sidekick." Still, Roberts recalled, she sometimes stole the show. "After Gloria Vanderbilt came on stage and did her scene, which was not very good unfortunately, I came out and said, 'It's floozies like her that raise hell with our racket,'" she explained years later. "Well, the audience went crazy. They stomped and whistled — their hands went flying into the air." The future star of "Everybody Loves Raymond" was such a hit, in fact, that the director of the play thought her comedic chops threatened to upend the whole show. He attempted to cut her line, but she begged him to let her get the laugh, and he gave in. "Every night the audience went insane," Roberts said. "It was a lot of fun."

After her debut in "The Time of Your Life," Doris Roberts enjoyed a long, fruitful career on the stage. It's the kind of Broadway run any actor would be proud of; she starred in productions like "The Desk Set" and "Last of the Red Hot Lovers." In the early 1970s, Hollywood came calling. At the time, comedian Lily Tomlin underwent a transformation from sketch-show regular to the host of her own show, and she saw Roberts act in a play called "Bad Habits." Roberts later told Parade, "Lily Tomlin saw me in Terrence McNally's play 'Bad Habits' and brought me out to California to do 'The Lily Tomlin Comedy Hour.' The show won the Emmys that year," she added. "But they did not pick us up." 

Roberts is likely referring to several hourlong comedy specials Tomlin filmed in the early '70s, several of which did indeed win Emmys, but there was no ongoing show to sign on to. Still, Roberts was hooked, and she left the stage behind for a while to make her way on screens both big and small. "I just kept getting all these wonderful comedies," she told Parade. "And the money was a lot better than Broadway."

Although Doris Roberts would later become a sitcom icon for her role as Marie on "Everybody Loves Raymond," she almost had a chance to make television history several decades earlier. Roberts almost won a role on "Maude," the iconic sitcom that starred future "Golden Girls" star Bea Arthur. Roberts later told The Archive of American Television that they delayed the show's filming for several weeks so she could finish her commitments to a stage play, and then they flew her out to Los Angeles to shoot the show. "Bea and I were old friends," she said. "We were wearing outfits done by the same woman in New York ... She said, 'I got it in brown.' I said, 'I got it in purple.' She said, 'I got it in black.' I said, 'I got it in blue.' We did our little routine together, and then we rehearsed a little bit."

Unfortunately, it didn't go over well with the show's producers, who decided she looked too similar to Arthur to be able to play the part. Arthur's future "Golden Girls" co-star Rue McClanahan got the role instead. Thankfully, Roberts quickly saw the situation as a blessing, because missing out on the "Maude" part meant she was suddenly available for anyone else who wanted her. "I was here, and the very next day I was offered everything," Roberts said. "It never stopped. It was wonderful."

In 1983, Doris Roberts won her first Emmy. Although she would later come to be known for her comedies, Roberts took home the statue that night for outstanding supporting actress in a drama series. She'd appeared on "St. Elsewhere," a legendary hospital show that was so well-respected that it even included cast members like Denzel Washington in the one role he never wanted to give up. 

"I loved that because I played with my dear friend, Jimmy Coco. I loved the work that I did in that show, too," Roberts explained to Reverend Hollywood, referring to her co-star on the episode.  "And I'm glad I won the Emmy for it." After all, Roberts was going through a tough time in her personal life. Her second husband, William Goyen, was dying of leukemia when Roberts was up for the award. She told The Archive of American Television, "He was holding me, and he said, 'Oh darling, I hope you win, to prove to the world that you do better work than "Love Boat."' And I did indeed win."

The same year Doris Roberts won her first Emmy, she also joined the cast of "Remington Steele," a detective show led by Pierce Brosnan. (This was just one of the surprising jobs Brosnan had before he was famous.) He played the titular character, who was in fact a fictional detective, a cover story for real investigative genius Laura Holt (Stephanie Zimbalist). Roberts signed on for the show's second season, playing the agency's receptionist Mildred Krebs. A reliable comedic presence, Roberts also tagged along on the duo's adventures, and she even did some of her own stunts. She later shared that the show took her to fantastic locations. "I loved 'Remington Steele' because it was a challenge — an hour show and one-camera filming," she told CNN. "We went to Mexico, England twice, Ireland twice, the south of France and Malta. It was great fun."

In addition to all of the fun she had while shooting the show, Roberts also felt Mildred was an important character. She would continue acting for decades after she played the part, but Roberts had already been in the business for a long time, and she knew roles like that were hard to come by. "I see Mildred as a great role model for middle-aged women," she told Gannet News Service in 1985 (via MeTV). "She has the courage to begin again, to do things she's never done before. She doesn't compete with young people, but she runs along with them."

In 1996, Doris Roberts signed on to what would become her most iconic role yet. On "Everybody Loves Raymond," she played Marie Barone, a fictionalized version of star Ray Romano's mother. Marie was an overbearing mother-in-law archetype, but she was also a mother who deeply loved her family, and audiences responded very well to the character. While speaking with Reverend Hollywood, Roberts said she met a fan once who said her son had been deployed to Iraq. This fan was overjoyed to meet her, she said, because Marie on "Everybody Loves Raymond" was the only thing that made her laugh. "Isn't that something? That I act and I love what I'm doing and that I could make someone's life better ... oh my goodness," Roberts said. "If I have a bad day, I think of that moment."

Sometimes, the cast of a sitcom doesn't always get along. For instance, the "Home Improvement" cast secretly featured rocky relationships behind the scenes, but Roberts insisted that wasn't the case on "Everybody Loves Raymond," which she found a pleasure to work on. "It's such fun to come to work, because with the whole cast, they're just fun people to be with!" she told CNN, referring to "Everybody Loves Raymond" cast members like Romano, Patricia Heaton, Brad Garrett, and Peter Boyle. "The atmosphere is just wonderful."

Doris Roberts had been in the business for a very long time before she was cast as Marie on "Everybody Loves Raymond." She'd been playing maternal characters for decades, showing off her skills in roles that were rare for women her age even decades before Marie came along. There was no one better, in other words, to testify to Congress about ageism. She appeared before the legislature in 2002, telling them that the entertainment industry needed to do better when it came to roles for older people. 

"The roles for women my age frequently show seniors in insulting and degrading ways. They make cartoons of the elderly," she said (via CNN). "I recently turned down a role in a movie in order for me to play a horny grandmother who spewed fowl language, exposed herself and chased after young boys. Well, I turned that one down. But I know someone who took that part." She pointed out that it hadn't always been that way. Iconic stars like Joan Crawford and Bette Davis remained famous long into their lives, but she worried that things were changing in the aughts. "Women start getting tummy tucks and facelifts in their 30s to forestall the day when the phone stops ringing," she said.

There are a few things you are certain to see when you put on an episode of "Everybody Loves Raymond." Ray's long-suffering wife Debra would probably act exasperated about something but in a funny way; the kids would probably do something frustrating yet adorable; Ray would probably get into a tussle with his brother, Robert; and you could reliably expect Marie to cook something. In fact, Doris Roberts cooked for real on the set of "Everybody Loves Raymond." She wrote a memoir called "Are You Hungry, Dear? Life, Laughs, and Lasagna," which also doubled as a cookbook. "If Brad [Garrett] wants a mortadella sandwich, I'm back there at the counter with real bread, mortadella, mayonnaise, lettuce, and cheese," Roberts wrote (via MeTV).

Roberts said it wasn't always as easy as making a sandwich. During one episode, she had to precisely time her character's pancake-making, matching the beats of the recipe to the comedic moments in the scene. "I pour, turn, and serve pancakes at just the right moment in the scene while acting a fairly substantial part in the events," she wrote. "During rehearsal, I did something completely out of character for Marie; I forgot to turn the pancakes over. They burned!" If you'd like to one-up Roberts and prove that you at least know you have to flip the pancakes over, check out the huge sin you're committing when you make pancakes.

In 2003, Doris Roberts used the height of her "Everybody Loves Raymond" fame to advocate for an important cause. That year, she played a role in one of the Hallmark movies that are totally worth your time, "A Time To Remember." Roberts played Maggie, an older woman who is in the early stages of Alzheimer's. The "Christmas Vacation" star took the part because it was a challenge, telling The Tennesseean (via MeTV) that she liked doing something out of her comfort zone, now that she'd been playing Marie for so many years straight. The role required some prep work, but Roberts was a professional, so she was up to the task. 

"I have a friend whose husband has the later stages of Alzheimer's. I have watched him over the years. I talked to my doctor about it. And I'm an actress," she said. "I put those elements together." Roberts also knew that the movie had to pull double-duty. In addition to being entertaining, she used it to send a message about the importance of the disease. "There are lessons you learn about Alzheimer's that must be told," she said. "We are living longer, and the baby boomers are living longer, and they are going to have to deal with this."

Although Doris Roberts won her first Emmy in the early 1980s, she picked up several more thanks to her role on "Everybody Loves Raymond." She was nominated for her role in 1999, and after she won for the first time in 2001, she just kept on winning, racking up trophies in 2002, 2003, and 2005. (The 2004 Emmy for outstanding supporting actress in a comedy series went to Cynthia Nixon for her role as Miranda on "Sex and the City."). However, Roberts still faced ageism, even despite all of the awards. 

Speaking with The Archive of American Television, she recounted a conversation with a journalist, in which she felt forced to prove herself despite having decades of experience to back up her claim that she had a story worth telling. "In one year, I've won my third Emmy, I have a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, I have a book on the New York Times bestseller list, and the United States government has made me a cultural ambassador and I go to foreign countries and talk to poor children about hope. You don't think there's a story here?" Roberts remembered saying. Still, Roberts went on to win several more Emmys after that. In 2005, she won for the final season of "Everybody Loves Raymond."

After "Everybody Loves Raymond" came to a close, Doris Roberts continued to act regularly. One of her most notable late-career roles came during the second season of "The Middle," which reunited her with "Everybody Loves Raymond" daughter-in-law Patricia Heaton. This time, Heaton played a protective mother, and Roberts was a schoolteacher who refused to acknowledge that Heaton's character's son was special. It was a total comedic reversal of their dynamic on "Everybody Loves Raymond," where Marie believed that Raymond could do no wrong.

Roberts spent that season as an occasional part of the cast of "The Middle." "It was so great to see Doris again and to work with her," Heaton told MyTakeOnTV (via MeTV). "She's been very busy, and we haven't had time to see each other. So, it's been a great opportunity." Roberts died a few years later, in 2016, joining the other "Everybody Loves Raymond" actors we've sadly lost. Her television son Ray Romano released a statement about what it had been like to work with the sitcom legend. He told People, "Whether working professionally or with her many charities, or just nurturing and mentoring a young, green comic trying to make it as an actor, she did it all with such a grand love for life and people and I will miss her dearly."