Stage and Screen Actress Irene Dailey Dies at 88

Irene Dailey, a star of Broadway and TV soaps, died on September 24 at the age of 88 from colon cancer in Santa Rosa, California. Most known for her Emmy Award-winning portrayal of the well-heeled matriarch Liz Matthews on the TV soap Another World from 1974 to 1986 and 1988 to 1994, Dailey made appearances on many small screen shows, including Ben Casey, The Defenders, The Edge of Night and The Twilight Zone, as well several films, including Five Easy Pieces, The Amityville Horror and The Grissom Gang. The New York-born performer was also an acclaimed theater actress, receiving high praise for Nettie Cleary, the role she created of the unhappy wife in Frank D. Gilroy’s 1964 Tony Award-winning drama The Subject Was Roses. Starting her long career in vaudeville at the age of eight, Dailey performed in summer stock as a teenager, landing theater roles in a string of flops before scoring with The Subject Was Roses.