Liz Sheridan

Early life

Sheridan was born in Rye, New York, the daughter of concert singer Elizabeth Poole-Jones and classical pianist Frank Sheridan.

Career

Sheridan may be best known for her recurring role as Jerry Seinfeld's mother, Helen, in Seinfeld. She played the role for all nine seasons, from 1989 to 1998. She starred in the 1976 Broadway play Best Friend before moving on to regular supporting roles in films and television series such as Moonlighting, Kojak, The A-Team, Murder, She Wrote, and Cagney & Lacey. Her first major role was playing nosy neighbor Raquel Ochmonek on the NBC TV series ALF. In 2009, Sheridan starred in the romantic comedy Play the Game, about a young ladies' man who teaches his dating tricks to his lonely, widowed grandfather who learns dating tricks from his serial romancer of a grandson. The film received attention for containing a sex scene between Sheridan and Griffith.

Personal life

While working as a dancer in New York City nightclubs, Sheridan met the then-unknown James Dean. She claims that she and Dean became engaged and had a short-lived romance. She wrote a book on this subject, Dizzy & Jimmy: My Life with James Dean: A Love Story, in which she claimed they were each other's first "romantic love". After Dean was cast in a play which looked to be successful, he drifted away from Sheridan and—despite the play's quick demise—this was the end of their affair.

Sheridan was married to William T. "Dale" Wales (1917–2003) from 31 December 1985 until his death. They have a married daughter, a photographer in New York's Greenwich Village, of whom Sheridan said, "I'm so unmotherly, I cannot tell you. I'm still a flower child somewhere. My daughter was more my friend than my daughter most of her life."