ROSEANNE BARR (Maggie) lends her comic timing and snappy delivery to a bossy cow who inspires the other animals to take action and save “Patch of Heaven.”
The brilliant comedic talents of this award-winning actress have dominated television and distinguished her among the funniest ladies on the air, alongside the legendary Lucille Ball, Mary Tyler Moore and Carol Burnett. Her ability to elevate her life experiences to a heightened comedic level, and by so doing bravely challenging television’s status quo, has been unparalleled. She has won a coveted Peabody Award, television’s highest honor; an Emmy award; two Golden Globes; two American Comedy Awards; six People’s Choice Awards; the Nickelodeon Kids Choice Award; the GLAAD Media Award; the Golden Apple Award; and the distinguished Eleanor Roosevelt award, given by the American Democratic Association to outstanding American women. Twice she has received the distinguished Humanitas Award presented to programming that best communicates human values.
Barr grew up in Salt Lake City, Utah, in a working-class Jewish family. At an early age she gained a clear sense that she had the ability to make people laugh. After dropping out of high school and getting married at 21, she moved to the mountains of Colorado and lived in an artists’ colony. She worked as a waitress, regaling her diners with an endless volley of hysterical remarks. Encouraged by her customers to turn her schtick into a comedy act, she went to The Comedy Club in downtown Denver and began her career as a standup comic. Basing her act on her views of life as a working-class woman, she gained instant recognition from the locals and quickly became the queen of Denver comedy.
While touring nationally on the comedy circuit, Los Angeles comedians Louie Anderson and Sam Kinison encouraged Barr to audition for Mitzi Shore at the Comedy Store. She did, and was instantly hired. The same night she was asked to appear on George Schlatter’s ABC-TV special Funny. During the rehearsal for Funny a talent scout for The Tonight Show saw her and booked her on the show. In the months that followed this astonishing week-long entertainment industry blitz, the comedienne made well-received appearances on The Tonight Show and other late-night talk shows before starring in her own comedy special for HBO.
In 1986, the Carsey-Werner Company approached Barr with a proposal for developing a situation comedy based on her standup routines. Roseanne debuted on ABC on October 18, 1988, and within a year overtook The Cosby Show as the number one show on television. Critics and viewers hailed the show as groundbreaking. Los Angeles Times columnist Howard Rosenberg surmised that “Roseanne was enormously influential, changing the ways viewers regarded sitcom families and their relationship with the world they portrayed,” adding that the series “matured into an extension of working-class America.” The series has gone on to become an award-winning and internationally syndicated hit seen in 150 countries worldwide.
Immediately after Roseanne finished its run in May 1997, Barr left for New York to portray the Wicked Witch of the West in the Madison Square Garden production of The Wizard of Oz. In a held-over six-week run, the show sold over 300,000 tickets, more than any Broadway show that year.
Her telefilm credits include Backfield in Motion and The Woman Who Loved Elvis. Her dramatic roles for film include “She-Devil,” “Look Who’s Talking Too,” “Even Cowgirls Get The Blues” and “Blue in the Face.” She has also appeared as herself in “Meet Wally Sparks,” “Get Bruce,” “Cecil B. Demented” and “15 Minutes.”
Barr remains actively involved in her own production company, Full Moon High Tide Productions. She has recently set up the Roseanne Foundation, working in conjunction and under the supervision of Dr. Colin Ross. The Foundation is a non-profit organization raising funds to develop and support programs with practical solutions dealing with the effects of child abuse.
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