Elizabeth McRae, best known for her recurring roles on “General Hospital” and “Gomer Pyle, USMC,” has died at the age of 88, Deadline reports.
After graduation, MacRae sought a career in acting, auditioning for a 1956 production of Otto Preminger’s Saint Joan. Despite not receiving a role, she persisted in her acting career. She moved to New York City, where she studied with Uta Hagen at the Herbert Berghof Studio and gained experience in off-Broadway shows.
McRae got her first television role as a witness in the courtroom series ‘The Verdict Is Yours.’ In a career spanning 25 years, McRae appeared in numerous television series, including Route 66, Surfside 6, Rendezvous, The Fugitive, Judd for the Defense, Gunsmoke, Bonanza, I Dream of Jeannie, The Andy Griffith Show and many others.
One of her most notable roles was that of Gomer Pyle, USMC, in which she played Gomer’s girlfriend Lou-Ann Poovey.
McRae also appeared on soap operas such as General Hospital, where she played Meg Baldwin from August 1969. She remained on the ABC daytime soap until 1973, when the character was killed off. Other soap operas McRae starred in included Another World, Days of Our Lives, Guiding Light, and Search for Tomorrow.
McRae’s films include Live in a Goldfish Bowl, Everything’s Ducky, The Incredible Mr. Limpet, and Francis Ford Coppola’s The Conversation.
She also appeared in Kojak, Barnaby Jones and Rhoda. McRae’s last film was in 1989, playing a reporter in Eddie and the Cruisers II: Eddie Lives!
Following her acting career, McRae and her husband, Charles Day Halsey Jr., moved to North Carolina and, several years later, returned to their home in Fayetteville. As Deadline reports, she has five stepchildren, Terry Halsey, Peter Halsey, Hugh Halsey, Kate Halsey, and Alex Halsey Topper.
