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Alison La Placa (born December 16, 1959, in New Jersey) is an American actress best known for her role of acid-tongued yuppie Linda Phillips in the Fox sitcoms Duet and its spin-off Open House, both of which aired in the late 1980s.
Though La Placa has guest-starred on some of the most successful programs in TV history: ER, Cheers, Family Ties, Desperate Housewives and Friends (as Rachel's boss, Joanna), she has become better known for her roles on short-lived sitcoms. La Placa was a regular on The Jackie Thomas Show (1992), Tom (1994), and the NBC sitcom The John Larroquette Show from 1994 to 1996. Because of her work on these less-successful shows, La Placa (like actors Ted McGinley, Rena Sofer, Carla Gugino, and Paula Marshall) is sometimes referred to as a "sitcom killer."
In continuation of this sinister theme, La Placa was a guest villainess on Batman the Animated Series, voicing the role of Baby Doll, a disgruntled has-been former sitcom star.
La Placa's presence in so many unsuccessful sitcoms inspired the Alison La Placa Open, a yearly contest in which players predict TV shows that will be canceled during the upcoming season.
La Placa is married to TV actor/director Philip Charles MacKenzie.
Early career
La Placa is a graduate of Stevenson High School in Lincolnshire, Illinois, a suburb of Chicago. She attended Illinois Wesleyan University, where she majored in drama.
Shortly after moving to Hollywood, La Placa landed the part of Elyse in TV sitcom version of Barry Levinson's film Diner. That pilot didn't get picked up though, and soon thereafter La Placa got a part in the made-for-TV movie Listen to Your Heart (1983). The following year she earned a regular spot on the first of her on-today, gone-tomorrow sitcoms, Suzanne Pleshette is Maggie Briggs (1984).
References
- Nenni, Pete. "Stevenson grads make a name for themselves in television roles", Daily Herald (Arlington Heights), May 13, 2003. Accessed January 20, 2008.
External links
- Please use a more specific IMDb template. See the documentation for available templates.