Mary Alice Passed Away!

Actress Mary Alice passed away.

Veteran actress and stage performer Mary Alice passed away. She won a Tony Award for Best Featured Actress in a Play in 1987 production of August Wilson's Fences.

Mary Alice Smith was a main character in the first two seasons of A Different World as Leticia "Lettie" Bostic, as the resident director for Denise, Jeleesa, Whitley, Freddie and Kim. She had that role for 25 episodes.

Mary retired from acting in 2005. 

The actress had died of natural causes says the New York Police Department.

The date of her birth is disputed. They said she was born in 1936 or 1941.

Mary Alice was born in Indianola, Mississippi, the daughter of Ozelar and Sam Smith. She had an natural ability to act and began her stage career at local theatres in Indianola. Her family moved to Chicago where she would graduate from Chicago's Teacher School known now as Chicago State University. 

Mary Alice taught at a elementary school soon after. She began a formal acting gig in the late 1960s.

Mary Alice made her debut in a film The Education of Sonny Carson. Then she would have television roles on Sanford & Son, Good Times and Police Woman.

She also played Effie Williams, the mother of three daughters who form a Supreme-like singing group, in the musical drama Sparkle. 

Mary Alice also had played Oracle in The Matrix franchise. 

In the 1980s she played Ellie Grant Hubbard in the soap All My Children.

She also appeared in the films Malcolm X, The Inkwell, Down in the Delta, Beat Street, To Sleep with Anger, Awakenings, The Bonfire of the Vanities and Sunshine State.

Mary Alice was inducted into the American Theatre Hall of Fame. 

Mary Alice was never married or had children.