Alex drummond instagram character actress and singer whose career spanned six decades. In 2015, she returned to film in the feature film Ricki and the Flash, with Meryl Streep, Kevin Kline, and Rick Springfield.

In November 2015, Rae released her autobiography, The Facts of My Life, which was co-written with her son, Larry Strauss. Charlotte Rae Lubotsky was born April 22, 1926, in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Meyer Lubotsky, were Russian Jewish immigrants. Lubotsky was a retail tire business owner. Rae attended Northwestern University, although she did not complete her studies.

While there, she met friend Cloris Leachman. Many years later, Leachman succeeded Rae on The Facts of Life for the show’s last two seasons. In 1954, Rae made her TV debut on episodes of Look Up and Live and The United States Steel Hour. Her first significant success was on the sitcom Car 54, Where Are You? Rae was a regular on the Rich Little Show, a variety show that ran for 11 episodes in 1976. In July 1979, Rae proposed the idea for a spinoff based on “The Girls’ School” episode from Diff’rent Strokes. NBC approved the show, to be called The Facts of Life, which would portray a housekeeper turned housemother for boarding students in a prestigious private school.

The Facts of Life not only gave Rae her best-known role but also finally made her a television star. The Facts of Life had marginal ratings at first, but after a major restructuring including some cast alterations, plus a time change for the second season, the show became a ratings winner between 1980 and 1986. Between the first and second seasons, Rae went on a very stringent diet and at the start of the second season had lost an enormous amount of weight. Towards the end of the seventh season, Rae began to contemplate leaving the series.

She wanted to spend more time doing theater as well as do some traveling. After her departure from The Facts of Life, Rae still kept busy acting. In 1993, she voiced the villainess, Aunt Pristine Figg, in Tom and Jerry: The Movie. In 2001, Rae, Lisa Whelchel, Mindy Cohn, and Kim Fields were reunited in a TV movie, The Facts of Life Reunion.