Linda Kelsey

For the journalist, see Linda Kelsey (journalist).

Linda Kelsey
Born (1946-07-28) July 28, 1946
Minneapolis, Minnesota, U.S.
OccupationActress
Years active1972–present
Spouses
  • William Grivna
    ​
    ​
    (m. 1971; div. 1973)​
  • Glenn Strand
    ​
    (m. 1979)​
Children2

Linda Kelsey (born July 28, 1946) is an American actress. She is best known for her role as Billie Newman on the CBS drama television series Lou Grant (1977–1982), which earned her three Golden Globe Award nominations and five Primetime Emmy Award nominations.

Early years

Kelsey was born on July 28, 1946, in Minneapolis, Minnesota.[1] She participated in dramatics in high school, in community theater, and at the University of Minnesota.[2]

Career

Kelsey's professional career began with stage appearances in her home of Minneapolis, Minnesota. After acting with the Guthrie Theater in Minneapolis for two years, she performed with the Long Wharf Theatre in Connecticut,[2] in Provincetown, Massachusetts,[3] and in other venues in other parts of the United States.[2] She also made commercials to pay for training in acting.[3]

She landed small roles on television shows like Emergency! and The Rookies, and the television movie The Picture of Dorian Gray (1973).[4] Her first recognition came with an appearance on an episode of The Mary Tyler Moore Show as a rival to Sue Ann Nivens (played by Betty White), where she met Ed Asner on the set, with whom she later worked on the spin-off show Lou Grant. Her appearance on The Mary Tyler Moore Show led to prominent guest appearances on shows like M*A*S*H, The Streets of San Francisco, Barnaby Jones, Spencer's Pilots, Quincy M.E., The Rockford Files, the television films The Last of Mrs. Lincoln (1976) Something for Joey (1977), Eleanor and Franklin (1976), Eleanor and Franklin: The White House Years (1977), and the miniseries Captains and the Kings (1976).[4] She also appeared in the episode "The Mask of Adonis" from the 1977 series Quinn Martin's Tales of the Unexpected (known in the United Kingdom as Twist in the Tale).[4]

Her big break came when producers of the television series Lou Grant decided that the actress playing the female reporter on the show was too young and perky.[1] After three episodes, they recast the part with Kelsey in the role of Billie Newman, the crusading reporter for the fictional Los Angeles Tribune, which also co-starred Asner. Kelsey received five consecutive Emmy Award nominations (1978 through 1982) for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Drama Series, losing four times to her Lou Grant costar Nancy Marchand and once to Kristy McNichol in Family. She also made several appearances on the various iterations of the game show Pyramid, including assisting a contestant in winning $100,000 on May 5, 1987.[4][5]

Six years after Lou Grant went off the air in 1982, Kelsey played the lead in the sitcom Day by Day (1988) as a woman who runs a daycare center out of her home.[4] The show ran for two seasons.

Kelsey continued to make guest appearances in television series and TV movies through the late 1990s, notably in the TV movie The Babysitter's Seduction and on several episodes of Murder, She Wrote.

After television work stopped coming in, Kelsey returned to her native Twin Cities area, where she has continued her career in regional theater productions, including in the title role of Mary Stuart at the Park Square Theater, a performance for which Talkin' Broadway described her as "beautiful, feminine, determined and regal throughout, even when she's giggling with her lady-in-waiting. She affects every man who comes to see her."[6] In 2009, she revisited her television past, playing Sue Ann Nivens for a week in a Minneapolis theatre company's restaging of The Mary Tyler Moore Show scripts, including the episode in which she originally appeared.[7][8]

Personal life

Kelsey married actor William Grivna in 1971; they divorced in 1973. In 1979, she married carpenter Glenn Strand, who later became a computer programmer.[9]

Awards

References

  1. ^ a b Daniel, Douglass K. (1996). Lou Grant : The Making of TV's Top Newspaper Drama. Syracuse, NY : Syracuse University Press. p. 81. ISBN 0815626754. "To the producers Kelsey brought to the role of a woman reporter what Balding had lacked. Linda Kelsey somehow had the maturity, the intelligence, the point of view, the kind of sentiment that was very believable,' Reynolds said. [...] Kelsey, who had appeared in a guest role in The Mary Tyler Moore Show three years earlier, thus became Tribune reporter Billie Newman. Kelsey, born in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on July 28, 1946, has appeared on The Rockford Files, Barnaby Jones, and several other series and in television movies."
  2. ^ a b c Buck, Jerry (August 13, 1978). "Linda Kelsey says 'Lou Grant'". Mount Vernon Argus. [(White Plains, New York]]. p. TV/Radio Week 16. Retrieved May 4, 2025 – via Newspapers.com.
  3. ^ a b Smith, Cecil (August 31, 1980). "She's a Lot Like Billie Newman". Tulsa World. p. TV World 7. Retrieved May 4, 2025 – via Newspapers.com.
  4. ^ a b c d e "Linda Kelsey". TVGuide.com. TV Guide. Archived from the original on March 20, 2023. Retrieved September 17, 2018.
  5. ^ "$100,000 Pyramid". YouTube. November 11, 2007.
  6. ^ Weir, Elizabeth. "An Off-Broadway hit and a rewrite of a classic open in Minneapolis". Talkin' Broadway. A nipped and tucked Mary Stuart takes off at Park Square
  7. ^ Gans, Andrew (August 27, 2009). "Torch Theatre to Present "The Mary Tyler Moore Show" Live Onstage". Playbill. Retrieved March 31, 2022.
  8. ^ Piane, Charlie (August 27, 2009). "Torch Theater Will Recreate 'The Mary Tyler Moore Show' Onstage As Fundraiser 9/11-26". Broadway World Minneapolis / St. Paul. Retrieved May 4, 2016.
  9. ^ Kalter, Suzy (January 14, 1980). "Linda ('Lou Grant') Kelsey's Marriage to a Carpenter Hits the Nail on the Head". People. Archived from the original on January 10, 2011. Retrieved May 4, 2016.
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