ʻRapping Grannyʼ leaves legacy

Former film and TV actor taught theater at Pierce, dies at 101

CARA HUNTER

Online Editor

@CaraRoundUp

Known for playing a sweet-looking old lady with sassy side, actress Ellen Albertini Dow died May 4, 2015. She was 101.

Best known for her role as Rosie the rapping grandmother in Adam

Sandler’s “The Wedding Singer,” she spent nearly 20 years teaching at Pierce College and has left a mark on the college to this day.

Theatre, most commonly known as the “Dow Theater,” which Pierce students attend daily.

Before she taught theater, Dow graduated from Cornell University at a time when women rarely pursued higher education. She mainly taught children’s and musical theater at Pierce from 1968 to 1989. She directed Pierce’s original production of “The Fantasticks” in the late 1960s, and Pierce commemorated her with a remounting of the musical in fall, 2014.

First film appearance

“American Drive-In” (1985)

First TV appearance

“The Twilight Zone” (1986)

Notable film roles

“Sister Act” (1992)

“The Wedding Singer” (1998)

Dow’s husband Eugene Dow founded the Pierce Theater Department in 1957. In 1968, Dow transferred to Pierce from L.A. City College, where she taught theater and choreography.

“Wedding Crashers” (2005)

Notable TV Roles

“Quantum Leap” (1993)

“Seinfeld” (1995)

“Six Feet Under” (2005)

The theater within the Performing Arts Center is named after Dow and her husband as The Eugene Francis & Ellen Albertini Dow Arena

“I think it’s so cool someone famous taught here,” said St. Clair Du-Berry, a theater student at Pierce. “It’s something we can all aspire to,”

Du-Berry said.

The daughter of Italian immigrants, Dow grew up in Pennsylvania. She began dancing at age 5, worked with Martha Graham and danced on Broadway three times. She then went on to teach miming for 19 years. Throughout her life, Dow played many memorable roles in film and TV. She made her film debut in

“American Drive-In” in 1985, and her television debut in “The Twilight Zone” one year later. According to IMDb, Dow holds the record as the longest living actor in “Star Trek” history.

In 2005, she played loud-mouthed Grandma in the box-office hit movie Wedding Crashers. That same year, she donated $150,000 to the Pierce Theater department for renovations to the small black box theatre. Thanks to Dow’s donation, new seating, lighting and sound equipment were installed, and the courtyard was created as well.

Dow never let age stand in the way of her love for Broadway. She would make three visits a year to see Broadway shows and return eager to tell her friends about what was worth seeing.

Dow’s friend of more than a decade and theater manager at

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But Rodriguez withdrew the offer and sent a letter to Pierce faculty and staff on May 4 to explain the withdrawal.

In the letter, Rodriguez said he nixed the offer “in the interest of maintaining stable leadership at Pierce College.” Scan the QR code below to read the letter in its entirety.

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East Los Angeles College’s Ryan Navarette defeated Pierce College’s Milo Anderson by three votes, 1,880 to 1,877, for the Student Trustee seat on the L.A. Community College District’s Board of Trustees. But the election is not final, according to Anderson. Read more on page 3.

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Pierce Michael Sande reflected on his memories of Dow.

“She would go see whatever the new shows were in Broadway and bring back the programs with her, and say what I should go see or what would be a waste of my money,” Sande said. “She didn’t pull any punches. She said it how it was and that rubbed people the wrong way.”

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