Vaccaro, Brenda

Brenda Vaccaro is an award-winning actress with more than 60 years of professional experience on Broadway, film, and television. Vaccaro is an in-demand voice actress today with a string of featured credits.

Brenda Vaccaro was elected an Honorary Lamb in 2023, sponsored by Magda Katz and Kevin C. Fitzpatrick.

She was nominated for three Tony Awards as Best Supporting or Featured Actress (Dramatic) for Cactus Flower (1966); Best Actress (Musical) for How Now, Dow Jones (1968) and in 1969 as Best Actress (Dramatic) for The Goodbye People. Vaccaro earned a Golden Globe nomination for her role as a socialite paying Jon Voight for sex in Midnight Cowboy (1969), and an Oscar nomination for Jacqueline Susann’s Once Is Not Enough (1975). She earned an Emmy Award for her performance in the revue by and about women, The Shape of Things (1974).

She has an impressive array of TV credits and earned excellent reviews for the lead role in the gentle romantic comedy Boynton Beach Club (2005) and for a brilliant supporting turn as Al Pacino’s sister in the HBO Dr. Kevorkian biopic, You Don’t Know Jack (2010). Even 60 years into her career, Vaccaro remains a vital, formidable actress with the training and talent to deliver award-caliber performances.

She was born Brenda Buell Vaccaro on November 18, 1939, in Brooklyn. Her father, Mario A. Vacarro, was a restaurateur and her mother Christine M. Pavia Vaccaro was his partner in the operation. As a child the family relocated to Dallas, Texas, where she was raised. Her parents co-founded the nationally-renowned Mario’s Restaurant. She got her start in school productions and was onstage at age 12.

Vacarro moved to New York and studied acting at the Neighborhood Playhouse under the legendary acting coach, Sanford Meisner. She made her Broadway debut in the 1961 comedy, Everybody Loves Opal, for which she won the Theatre World Award. Pairing her unmistakable husky voice with her acting talent, Vaccaro immediately stood out to critics and fans alike, and she earned a long string of Broadway credits, including Cactus Flower (1965), How Now, Dow Jones (1967), and The Goodbye People (1968), earning a Tony nomination for each of those roles.

Already the owner of a lengthy television résumé, her breakthrough in film came with the iconic hit Midnight Cowboy (1969), for which she earned a Golden Globe nomination playing a sexually voracious socialite who helps Jon Voight start up his male hustling business. She also earned a Golden Globe nomination for Most Promising Newcomer with her role of a sharp-witted secretary in Where It’s At (1969).

Vaccaro ably supported Robert Mitchum as his sweetheart in the powerful but downbeat Going Home (1971), then won an Emmy for her performance in the revue by and about women, The Shape of Things (1974). After four years away from the big screen, Vaccaro roared back with a Golden Globe-winning, Oscar-nominated turn as wisecracking magazine editor Linda Riggs in Jacqueline Susann’s Once Is Not Enough (1975). She tackled the tough role of a woman battling a gang of Canadian punks intent on rape in the dark, but cerebral horror thriller, Death Weekend (1976) and then earned an Emmy nomination for the short-lived Sara (CBS, 1975-1976), about a frontier schoolteacher.

Vaccaro played James Brolin’s wife in the NASA conspiracy thriller Capricorn One (1977) – for which she earned a Best Supporting Actress Saturn Award nomination – and a threatened passenger in the cheesy-but-effective disaster smash, Airport ’77 (1977).

Vaccaro worked constantly and successfully in all genres, but comedy was her forte, and she marked memorable turns as a villain’s sexually frustrated wife in Zorro, the Gay Blade (1981) and as Faye Dunaway’s wisecracking fellow witch in Supergirl (1984). She impressed even in subpar material, perfecting the art of stealing a project from the supporting sidelines. She chewed up scenery to delightful effect as top teen model Nicollette Sheridan’s stage mother/manager in the campy Morgan Fairchild nighttime soap, Paper Dolls (ABC, 1984). Fleshing out her résumé with impressive guest-starring TV credits, Vaccaro kept busy, earning an Emmy nomination for an appearance on The Golden Girls (NBC, 1985-1992), as the widow of Dorothy’s cross-dressing, never-seen brother. The actress continued to be an in-demand second banana, ably sparring with Valerie Harper in Stolen: One Husband (CBS, 1990) and Ann-Margret in Following Her Heart (NBC, 1994), before playing the mother of Joey (Matt LeBlanc) in “The One with the Boobies” episode in the first season of Friends (NBC, 1995).

She essayed great humor and vulnerability on the big screen as Barbra Streisand’s frumpy best friend in the Oscar-nominated hit, The Mirror Has Two Faces (1996), in which she had to deal with feelings of abandonment when Streisand transforms from ugly duckling to swan.

Whether or not they could identify her by name, millions of children had grown up hearing Vaccaro voice characters on everything from Nestor, the Long-Eared Christmas Donkey (ABC, 1977), The Smurfs, The Jetsons Meet the Flintstones, Darkwing Duck, The Critic, Johnny Bravo, and American Dad.

Vaccaro considered quitting show business completely and moving to France. Vaccaro was then cast in the HBO drama You Don’t Know Jack (2010), a pedigreed film about the life and career of controversial doctor-assisted-suicide advocate, Jack Kevorkian. Director Barry Levinson and star Al Pacino – who was an old theater buddy of the actress – were both fans of Vaccaro’s work, and she landed the role of Kevorkian’s protective sister, Margo Janus. Reviewers raved about the film, especially about Vaccaro’s performance, predicting she would be shortlisted for all the top awards. She was indeed nominated for an Emmy for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Miniseries or Movie in 2010.

Vaccaro continues to work; she had small parts in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood (2019) for director-writer Quentin Tarantino, and the HBO series And Just Like That (2021).

Vaccaro lives in Manhattan. In 1992 she was named “Queen of Brooklyn” at the Welcome Back to Brooklyn Festival.

Stage Appearances
(Stage debut) Angelina, The Willow Tree, Margo Jones Theatre, Dallas, TX, 1951
(Broadway debut) Gloria Gulock, Everybody Loves Opal, Longacre Theatre, 1961
Miss Novick, Tunnel of Love, Westbury Music Fair, Westbury, NY, 1962
Laura Howard, The Affair, Henry Miller’s Theatre, New York City, 1962
Melissa Peabody, Children from Their Games, Morosco Theatre, New York City, 1963
Toni, Cactus Flower, Royale Theatre, New York City, 1965
Reedy Harris, The Natural Look, Longacre Theatre, 1967
Cynthia, How Now, Dow Jones, Lunt-Fontanne Theatre, New York City,1967
Nancy Scott, The Goodbye People, Ethel Barrymore Theatre, New YorkCity, 1968
Louise, Father’s Day, John Golden Theatre, New York City, 1971
Olive Madison, The Odd Couple, Broadhurst Theatre, New York City,1985
Diana Vreeland, Full Gallop, Coronet Theatre, Hollywood, CA, 1998

Film Appearances
(Film debut) Molly Hirsch, Where It’s At, United Artists, 1969
Shirley Gardner, Midnight Cowboy, United Artists, 1969
Jody Burrows, I Love My Wife, Universal, 1970
Jenny Benson, Going Home, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, 1971
Vanetta, Summertree, Columbia, 1971
Linda Riggs, Once Is Not Enough, Paramount, 1975
Eve Clayton, Airport ’77, Universal, 1977
Diane, The House by the Lake, American International, 1977
Kay Brubaker, Capricorn One, Warner Bros., 1978
Grace Wolf, Fast Charlie … The Moonbeam Rider, Universal, 1979
Monica Gilbert, The First Deadly Sin, Filmways, 1980
Florinda, Zorro, the Gay Blade, Twentieth Century-Fox, 1981
Chanel Solitaire, United Film Distribution, 1981
Bianca, Supergirl, TriStar, 1984
Dolores, Water, Rank/Atlantic Releasing, 1985
Betty Rivers, Heart of Midnight, Samuel Goldwyn, 1989
Bunny, Cookie, Warner Bros., 1989
Marion Marshall, Ten Little Indians, Cannon, 1990
Lethal Games, 1990
Elaina Hart, The Masque of the Red Death, RCA, 1991
Nora Stillman, Love Affair, Warner Bros., 1994
Doris, The Mirror Has Two Faces, TriStar, 1996

Television Appearances
Shirley Campbell, What’s a Nice Girl Like You … ?, ABC, 1971
Dr. Carol Gillman, Sunshine, CBS, 1973
Rosalie Bonanno, Honor Thy Father, CBS, 1973
Lillian Jacobs, A Long Way Home, ABC, 1981
Marion Galucci, The Pride of Jesse Hallam, CBS, 1981
Voice, The Jetsons Meet the Flintstones (animated), syndicated, 1987
Lisa Jarrett, Stolen: One Husband (also known as I Want Him Back!), CBS, 1990
Jess McCann, Columbo: Murder in Malibu, ABC, 1990
Martha, The Red Shoe Diaries (also known as Wild Orchid III: Red Shoe Diaries), Showtime, 1992
Cecile, Following Her Heart, NBC, 1994
Sally, When Husbands Cheat, Lifetime, 1998

TV Series
Sara Yarnell, Sara, CBS, 1976
Detective Sergeant Kate Hudson, Dear Detective, CBS, 1979
Julia Blake, Paper Dolls, ABC, 1984
Voice of Scuple, The Smurfs (animated; also known as Smurfs’ Adventures), 1986-1990
Voice of Bunny Bravo, Johnny Bravo (animated), Cartoon Network, 1997