Sadie Gertrude Stern (October 31, 1934 – November 17, 2023), known professionally as Suzanne Shepherd, was an American actress and theater director.

Background

Shepherd was born Sadie Gertrude Stern on October 31, 1934, to a Jewish family in Elizabeth, New Jersey, the daughter of Dora (Mendelson), a cook, and David Stern, a distributor of jukeboxes and vending machines. She began using the name "Suzanne" when she was 13. She attended Battin High School and Bennington College, and studied acting with Sanford Meisner. She later went on to teach Meisner's program of acting study, the first woman to do so.

Career

Shepherd was a founding member of the Compass Players in the early 1960s, along with Alan Alda and Alan Arkin. Shepherd was known for her portrayal of Aunt Tweedy in the film Mystic Pizza, Karen's overbearing mother in the film Goodfellas, Carmela Soprano's mother Mary DeAngelis in the HBO television series The Sopranos, and the assistant school principal in Uncle Buck. She also played the role of Mrs. Scarlini in the 2000 film Requiem for a Dream, and Big Ethel in A Dirty Shame. In 2016, she played the role of Lucille Abetemarco the mother of Detective Anthony Abetemarco played by former Sopranos co-star Steve Schirripa in "Good Cop Bad Cop" the second episode of the seventh season of the CBS police procedural drama Blue Bloods. In 2018, she reprised the role of Lucille Abetemarco in "Trust" the sixth episode of the ninth season of Blue Bloods. Shepherd was also a theatre director, working in New York and in regional theatre.

Personal life and death

From a marriage to David Shepherd, which lasted from 1957 until their divorce in 1966, she had a son, who died in 2011, and a daughter, artist Kate Shepherd. Her second marriage, to Carroll Calkins, lasted from 1996 until his death in 2006. Shepherd died from chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and kidney failure at her home in Manhattan on November 17, 2023, at the age of 89.

Filmography

Film

Television