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The movies are the only business where you can go out front and applaud yourself.
Will Rogers
Lillian Randolph is famous for playing the role of Madam Queen on the Old Time Radio show, "Amos N Andy". Also played the role on the TV Series. Portrayed the family maid Birdie Lee Coggins on NBC Radio's "The Great Gildersleeve" (1941-1954).
Lillian Randolph
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Lillian Randolph
14 December 1898, Louisville, Kentucky
12 September 1980, Los Angeles, California
Lillian Randolph (December 14, 1898 - September 12, 1980) was an American actress and singer, a veteran of radio, film, and television.
A native of Louisville, Kentucky, she was the younger sister of actress Amanda Randolph. An African American, she worked in entertainment from the 1930s well into the 1970s, appearing in hundreds of radio shows, motion pictures, short subjects, and television shows. Randolph is best known as the maid Birdie Lee Coggins from The Great Gildersleeve radio comedy and subsequent films and television series, and as Madame Queen on the Amos 'n' Andy television show from 1951 to 1953. Her best known film role was that of Annie in It's a Wonderful Life. She appeared in several featured roles on Sanford and Son and The Jeffersons in the 1970s.
Her most notable work in films, however, is her uncredited voiceover part as the maid character in William Hanna and Joseph Barbera's Tom and Jerry cartoon short subjects for Metro Goldwyn Mayer during the 1940s and early 1950s. Many of these would have another actress redubbing the character in American TV broadcasts and in the DVD collections.
Randolph made a guest appearance on a 1972 episode of the sitcom Sanford and Son as Aunt Hazel, an inlaw of the Fred Sanford (Redd Foxx) character who humorously gets a cake thrown in her face, after which Fred replies "Hazel, you never looked sweeter!".
Randolph died of cancer in Los Angeles, California on September 12, 1980 at the age of 81. She was buried in Forest Lawn Memorial Park (Hollywood Hills). But, due to a mistake, her grave says she was born on 1914.
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