Madelyn Cates; Broadway, TV Actress

Madelyn Cates, 68, Broadway and television actress perhaps best remembered as the concierge in Mel Brooks’ film “The Producers.” The New York native studied at Queens College, the Waldorf School, New York Law School and with Paula Strasberg at the Actors Studio. She made her stage debut as Adelaide in “Guys and Dolls” in Winter Park, Fla., in 1956 and her Broadway debut a decade later as the patient in “Marat/Sade.” Other Broadway and off-Broadway plays included “A Patriot for Me,” “The Kitchen” and “Snowangel.” In Los Angeles, she appeared in “Follies,” “Lenny,” “Side by Side by Sondheim” and other performances at the Colony Studio Theater and in productions at the Studio Theatre Playhouse, Theatre West and Theatre Exchange. She was seen on television in the series “Hill Street Blues,” “St. Elsewhere,” “Cagney & Lacey” and “thirtysomething.” On July 14 in Los Angeles of pancreatic cancer.