Norma MacMillan

Normana Macmillan was born on15 September 1921, Vancouver, BC. Macmillan got her start as a stage actor. Thor Arngrim was co-founder of Vancouver’s first year-round professional theatre company, Totem Theatre. One of his hires was Norma Macmillan, who had studied speech at London’s Trinity College. ‘We weren’t attracted to each other in the beginning, but she was a superb actress, and she could type,” he said, laughing. In the early ’50s, the couple moved to Toronto and then New York, where Ms Macmillan worked for CBC Radio and Arngrim made films for the National Film Board. In New York, Ms Macmillan first landed the role of Casper the Friendly Ghost. In the 1960s, they moved to Hollywood, where Ms Macmillan became the voices of the bendable green Gumby in the ground-breaking claymation series Gumby and Pokey, and voiced Sweet Polly Purebred, in Underdog. Norma’s cartoon characters captivated a generation. ”She loved Casper,” Arngrim said. ”Almost on a daily basis, someone . . . would ask her to do it and she’d do it.” They raised two children: Alison, (Nellie on Little House on the Prairie), and Stefan, who works in Vancouver’s film industry. The couple returned to Vancouver, planning to retire, but continued to work. Ms Macmillan acted in movies, including one with Katharine Hepburn, Mrs. Delafield Wants to Marry. Her plays, including A Crowded Affair and Free as a Bird, were produced in Canada and the United States. In her later years, Norma Macmillan was the host of a program for seniors on Vancouver’s Co-op radio. She died on Mar. 16, 2001