Actors

Zara Cully

Zara Cully Brown will always be remembered as crotchety old Mother Olivia Jefferson, forever spoiling her son George and judging Louise. Cully was born in 1892 and didn't appear in any major roles until the late 1960s. After appearing on episodes of Night Gallery, The Mod Squad and Days of Our Lives, she played an aging voodoo queen in the 1974 movie Sugar Hill. The same year, she began her stint as Mother Jefferson on All in the Family, followed by The Jeffersons. Cully died of cancer on Feb. 28, 1978.