...in this whistful tale of a prairie farm woman, overlooked and eventually left abandoned by them after all of them die...
...this role, which could easily be over or under played, but in Mary LaRoche's hands it is just as it was written... a character who acknowledges a hard-scrabble, tragedy-filled life in a sardonic, yet undefeated manner...
...Mary starred in hundreds of stage and Hollywood productions; and she IS that type of omni-present character actor whose name you can't quite think of...
...Mary is often remrmbered for her roles in the films "Gidget", and "Bye-Bye Birdie"... and for dizens of trlevision episodes on "Alfred Hitchcock Presents", "Gunsmoke", "Twilight Zone" among them...
...it IS a rare thing when a character actor's performance literally overshadows those of the entirety of the other cast members...and Mary's superb talents do just that in this episode...
..if you ever have a chance, be sure to catch one of Mary's sterling portrayals...she was a real gem...