Little Known Spaghetti Western Actors ~ Ruth Buzzi

[These daily posts will cover little known actors or people that have appeared in more recent films and TV series. Various degrees of information that I was able to find will be given and anything that you can add would be appreciated.]

Ruth Ann Buzzi was born in Westerly, Rhode Island on July 24, 1936. She is the daughter of Rena Pauline and Angelo Peter Buzzi, a nationally recognized stone sculptor. Her father, who came from a Swiss family, immigrated from Arzo, Switzerland in 1923. She was raised in the village of Wequetequock in the town of Stonington, Connecticut, in a rock house overlooking the ocean at Wequetequock Cove, where her father owned Buzzi Memorials, a business that her older brother Harold operated until his retirement in 2013

Buzzi attended Stonington High School, where she was head cheerleader. At 17, she enrolled at the Pasadena Playhouse College of Theatre Arts, from which she graduated with honors in June 1957.

Before graduation from college, Buzzi was already a working actress with a union card in musical and comedy revues. Her first job in show business was at 19, traveling with singer Rudy Vallee in a live musical and comedy act during her summer break from college; it allowed her to graduate with an Actors' Equity Association union card. She moved to New York City after graduation and was hired immediately for a lead role in an off-Broadway musical revue, the first of 19 in which she performed around the East Coast. She worked alongside other young performers just beginning their careers at the time, including Barbra Streisand, Joan Rivers, Dom DeLuise, Bernadette Peters, and Carol Burnett. She performed in New York musical variety shows, and she made numerous television commercials, some of which won national awards including the Clio Award.

In 1967, Buzzi appeared in all eight episodes of ‘The Steve Allen Comedy Hour’, a variety series starring Steve Allen. Her character parts in the Allen sketches led her to be cast for NBC's new show ‘Rowan and Martin's Laugh-In’. She was the only featured player to appear in every episode of Laugh-In including the pilot for the show and the Laugh-In television special.

Buzzi voiced the character Nose Marie in the Hanna-Barbera animated series Pound Puppies (1986). She also voiced Mama Bear in Berenstain Bears (1985) and performed hundreds of guest voices for many other cartoon series, including The Smurfs, The Angry Beavers, and Mo Willems' Sheep in the Big City.

Buzzi lives with her husband, actor Kent Perkins, on a 600-acre cattle and horse ranch near Stephenville, Texas. The couple are avid automobile collectors.

In July 2022, it was reported that Buzzi had suffered a series of strokes but recovered.

Ruth has appeared in three Euro-western films and TV series. She played Ma Dalton on Terence Hill’s ‘Lucky Luke’ 1990 TV series, was a voice actress on the 1993 animated TV series ‘Wild West C.O.W.-Boys of Moo Mesa’ and as Maw the parents of Trinity and Bambino in 1994 “Toublemakers”.

BUZZI, Ruth (Ruth Ann Buzzi) [7/24/1936, Westerly, Rhode Island, U.S.A. -     ] – theater, film, TV, voice actress, singer, married to Basil P. ‘Bill’ Keko [1935-1992] (1965-1975), married to producer, writer, actor Kent Perkins [1948-    ] (1978-    ).

Lucky Luke (TV) – 1990 (Ma Dalton)

Wild West C.O.W.-Boys of Moo Mesa (TV) – 1993 [voice]

Troublemakers – 1994 (Maw) “Botte di Natale”