Zohra Lampert: Movies & Box Office

Zohra Lampert (born May 13, 1937) in Manhattan, New York City, is a retired American actress whose career spanned more than six decades across stage, film, and television. The only child of Russian‑Jewish immigrants Rose and Morris Lampert, she grew up in Washington Heights where her father worked in a hardware store, and she attended the High School of Music & Art before graduating from the University of Chicago in 1952. After university she studied acting at HB Studio with Uta Hagen and with Mira Rostova, joining the Playwrights Theatre Club in Chicago alongside future stars such as Ed Asner. Her breakthrough came when she was cast as Grisha in Brecht’s Caucasian Chalk Circle, a role that convinced her to pursue acting rather than a scholarly vocation. Lampert’s early Broadway work was billed under her married name, Zohra Alton, including a 1956 appearance in Diary of a Scoundrel and a Tony‑nominated performance in Look: We’ve Come Through (1962). She earned a second Tony nomination for Mother Courage and Her Children (1963) and became a founding member of the Lincoln Center Repertory Theater in 1964.

In the 1970s Lampert achieved cult status as the title character in the horror classic Let’s Scare Jessica to Death (1971) and later won a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Guest Actress for her role in a 1975 episode of Kojak. Her television résumé includes regular roles on The Girl with Something Extra, Doctors’ Hospital, and a memorable turn as Ellie Jardin on the soap Where the Heart Is. After a quieter period in the 1980s and 1990s, she returned to film with supporting parts in The Exorcist III, The Hungry Ghosts (2009), and Zenith (2010). Married first to fellow Second City founder Bill Alton and later to radio personality Jonathan Schwartz, Lampert remains a respected figure in American theatre and cinema.