Biography
Katherine Marie Helmond (July 5, 1929 – February 23, 2019) was an American film, theater, and television actress, and director. Over her five decades of television acting, she was known for her starring role as ditzy matriarch Jessica Tate on the ABC prime time soap opera sitcom Soap (1977–1981) and her co-starring role as feisty mother Mona Robinson on Who's the Boss? (1984–1992). She also played Doris Sherman on Coach and Lois Whelan, the mother of Debra Barone, on Everybody Loves Raymond. Sh...
Known For
Complete Filmography

Frank and Ava
2020
as Betty
A destitute Frank Sinatra pursues sultry starlet Ava Gardner while campaigning for the lead in 'From Here to Eternity'.

Cars 3
2017
as Lizzie (voice)
Blindsided by a new generation of blazing-fast racers, the legendary Lightning McQueen is suddenly pushed out of the sport he loves. To get back in th...

The Radiator Springs 500½
2014
as Lizzie (voice)
A 'leisurely drive' planned in honor of Radiator Springs’ town founder, Stanley, turns precarious as Baja pros descend on the town and challenge Light...

Time Travel Mater
2012
as Lizzie (voice)
When a clock lands on Mater's engine, he travels back in time to 1909 where he meets Stanley, an ambitious young car on his way to California. With th...

Collaborator
2011
as Irene Longfellow
A playwright whose marriage and career are in a free fall has an explosive run-in with his former neighbor, a right-wing ex-con.

Cars 2
2011
as Lizzie (voice)
Star race car Lightning McQueen and his pal Mater head overseas to compete in the World Grand Prix race. But the road to the championship becomes rock...

Cars Toon Mater's Tall Tales
2010
as Lizzie
Mater the tow truck travels from country to country as he retells his infamous but unbelievable stories.

Pixar Short Films
2009
as Lizzie (voice)
A collection of 20 computer-animated short films including "Rescue Squad Mater", "Jack-Jack Attack", and Oscar-winners "For The Birds", "Geri's Game",...

What Is Brazil?
2008
as Self
Rob Hedden's witty on-set documentary captures the revolutionary air that had begun to swirl around Brazil even before the controversy surrounding its...

A Grandpa for Christmas
2007
as Roxie Famosa
An old-time movie-star singer/ hoofer rebonds with his estranged daughter and 9-year-old granddaughter.

Mater and the Ghostlight
2006
as Lizzie (voice)
Mater, the rusty but trusty tow truck from Cars, spends a day in Radiator Springs playing scary pranks on his fellow townsfolk. That night at Flo's V8...

Cars
2006
as Lizzie (voice)
Lightning McQueen, a hotshot rookie race car driven to succeed, discovers that life is about the journey, not the finish line, when he finds himself u...

Beethoven's 5th
2003
as Crazy Cora Wilkens
When Sara takes Beethoven to spend summer vacation with wacky Uncle Freddie in an old mining town, the mischievous canine "digs up" the missing clue t...

Mr. St. Nick
2002
as Queen Carlotta
King Nicholas XX is ready to retire and pass the throne to his son, Nick St. Nicholas. But he is a no-show, preferring his lavish seaside lifestyle an...

Living in Fear
2000
as Mrs. Ford
A man returning to his childhood home for the reading of a will is met with hostility. Do the townsfolk know more about him than his new wife?

How to Marry a Billionaire: A Christmas Tale
2000
Three broke men try to become rich by finding rich women.

The Perfect Nanny
2000
as Mrs. McBride
Upon her release from a mental institution where she was recovering from a suicide attempt, Andrea McBride applies for the position of nanny for a han...

Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas
1998
as Desk Clerk at Mint Hotel
Raoul Duke and his attorney Dr. Gonzo drive a red convertible across the Mojave desert to Las Vegas with a suitcase full of drugs to cover a motorcycl...

Ms. Scrooge
1997
as Maude Marley
Television movie updating Charles Dickens' story, "A Christmas Carol." Businesswoman Ebenita Scrooge treats her employees and customers poorly. She ha...

The Flight of the Dove
1994
as Dr. Pamela Schilling
An explosives expert fleeing his past and a beautiful spy trading sex for secrets find themselves in love and fighting the spy ring out to kill them.

Amore!
1993
as Mildred Schwartz
Saul Schwartz, a married successful businessman, is bored with his life and decides he has had enough. So he gets a divorce, quits his job, and goes o...

The Elvira Show
1993
as Aunt Minerva
Filmed for CBS in 1993, this unaired pilot features the witch Elvira, her aunt, and their pet cat welcoming a long-lost niece into their new Kansas ho...

Inside Monkey Zetterland
1992
as Honor Zetterland
An off beat comedy about an out of work screen writing/artist that complains about being too cool, too talented and way too gay.

Grass Roots
1992
as Emma Carr
This sequel to the 1983 miniseries, "Chiefs," continues the saga of the Lee family with Will Lee, an ambitious Georgia lawyer running for the U.S. Sen...
Deception: A Mother’s Secret
1991
as Geena Milner
When a widower tries to adopt his wife’s son he’s shocked by what he discovers about her past.

The Perfect Tribute
1991
as Farm Woman
A boy risks life and limb to travel across the war-torn southern states of America during the height of hostilities in the Civil War, hoping to visit ...

When Will I Be Loved?
1990
as Barbara Patterson
Three disillusioned wives who are contemplating divorce compare notes on their stormy marriages.

Lady in White
1988
as Amanda
Locked in a school closet during Halloween 1962, young Frank witnesses the ghost of a young girl and the man who murdered her years ago. Shortly after...
Save the Dog!
1988
Becky wants to become an actress. After an audition for a dog food ad she has best chances to get the part - but the day after her dog Petey becomes v...

Overboard
1987
as Edith Mintz
Heiress Joanna Stayton hires carpenter Dean Proffitt to build a closet on her yacht—and refuses to pay him for the project when it's done. But after J...

Christmas Snow
1986
as Mrs. Mutterance
A shop owner who is being evicted at Christmas rescues her Scrooge-like landlord from an accident.

Shadey
1985
as Lady Constance Landau
A young man discovers that not only does he have the ability to read minds, but that if he holds a camera next to his head he can transmit the thought...

Brazil
1985
as Mrs. Ida Lowry
Low-level bureaucrat Sam Lowry escapes the monotony of his day-to-day life through a recurring daydream of himself as a virtuous hero saving a beautif...

Jack and the Beanstalk
1983
as Jack's Mother
Imaginative and creative Jack seeks adventure while trying to provide for himself and his mother. Will he ever solve the mystery of how his father die...

Rosie: The Rosemary Clooney Story
1982
as Frances Clooney
The story of singer Rosemary Clooney's rise to fame, her marriage to Jose Ferrer, and her nervous breakdown.

For Lovers Only
1982
as Bea Winchell
A man, his daughter, and son-in-law run a honeymoon resort in the Poconos.

Time Bandits
1981
as Mrs. Ogre
Young history buff Kevin can scarcely believe it when six dwarfs emerge from his closet one night. Former employees of the Supreme Being, they've purl...

Scout's Honor
1980
as Pearl Bartlett
Gary Coleman stars as little Joey Seymour, a clever but lonely orphan shuffled from one foster home to the next, who is also determined to be the best...

Diary of a Teenage Hitchhiker
1979
as Elaine Thurston
A rebellious 17-year-old girl ignores parental advice and joins her friends as a beach-bound regular on the local hitchhiking circuit, being picked up...

Getting Married
1978
as Vera Lesser
A man falls madly in love with a pretty newscaster and goes all out to win her heart and her hand in marriage before she weds another man.

Little Ladies of the Night
1977
as Miss Colby
The sister of ex-pimp and current Los Angeles Police detective Lyle York was murdered working the streets a few years ago. Since his reform, he has te...
Liza’s Pioneer Diary
1976
as Aunt Sara
The story of a gentle, unsure young woman who grows in maturity and self-reliance as she travels across the American plains in 1848 in a wagon train w...

Wanted: The Sundance Woman
1976
as Mattie Riley
Katharine Ross repeats her portrayal of Etta Place (from "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid") in this adventure of the fugitive who, alone and desper...

Baby Blue Marine
1976
as Mrs. Hudkins
A would-be Marine fails basic training, and is sent home wearing the "baby blue" fatigues of a washout. En route, he is mugged by a battle-fatigued Ma...

Family Plot
1976
as Mrs. Maloney
Spiritualist Blanche Tyler and her cab-driving boyfriend encounter a pair of serial kidnappers while trailing a missing heir in California.

James Dean
1976
as Claire Folger
A dramatization of the story of legendary movie actor James Dean. The film's writer, William Bast, had roomed with Dean in the early '50s, when both w...

The Hindenburg
1975
as Mrs. Mildred Breslau
Colonel Franz Ritter, a former hero pilot now working for military intelligence, is assigned to the great Hindenburg airship as its chief of security....

The First 36 Hours of Dr. Durant
1975
as Nurse Katherine Gunther
A young doctor fresh out of medical school takes a job at a big-city hospital, and on his first day finds himself making life-and-death decisions.

Cage Without a Key
1975
as Mrs. Little
A high school girl who needs a ride accepts one from a boy she doesn't know. He then forces her to participate in a robbery, in which a clerk is kille...

The Family Nobody Wanted
1975
as Mrs. Bittner
A minister and his wife take in poor and troubled children that nobody else wants and soon they find themselves with a family of a dozen kids.

The Legend of Lizzie Borden
1975
as Emma Borden
A dramatization of the famous 1893 Massachusetts trial of the woman accused of murdering her father and stepmother with an ax.

Locusts
1974
as Claire Fletcher
A swarm of locusts appears on the horizon near a Midwestern town and the inhabitants must find a way to destroy or divert them before the insects devo...

Larry
1974
as Maureen Whitten
A man who has been confined from early childhood to a dubiously run home for the mentally challenged is transferred to a state mental hospital when th...

Dr. Max
1974
as Libby Oppel
A small-town doctor neglects his family to look after his patients.

The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman
1974
as Lady at House
In February, 1962, as the civil rights movement reaches Bayonne, Louisiana, a New York journalist arrives to interview Jane Pittman, who has just turn...

The Hospital
1971
as Marilyn Mead
Dr. Bock, the chief of medicine at a Manhattan hospital, is suicidal after the collapse of his personal life. When an intern is found dead in a hospit...

Wine of Morning
1955
as Irene
A story of bloodshed and shipwreck, of intrigue and murder, of love and redemption. The film traces the life of Joel, a promising young man who turns ...