Patricia Heaton is one of the most prominent sitcom actors of the past
few decades. You know her and love her for Everybody Loves Raymond and The Middle,
but what else is there to know about this funny lady? This is the untold truth of Patricia Heaton.
Patricia Heaton grew up far away from the bright lights of Hollywood, though she was actually
raised by a minor local celebrity. She was born in 1958 in the Cleveland, Ohio suburb of Bay Village,
and her father was the late Chuck Heaton. He was a sportswriter and author of the popular
column "Plain Talk" for the Cleveland Plain Dealer, where he worked for more than 50 years.
"Bay Village is kind of like Mayberry, isn't it? You know, it's just a great place for families."
Around the time that Patricia turned 13 in 1971, her mother Pat died of a brain aneurysm,
leaving Chuck to raise his five children on his own. Patricia's siblings include her
brother Michael, who followed in his father's footsteps by writing for the Cleveland Plain
Dealer for many years, and her sister Sharon, who joined the Dominican order and became a nun.
Patricia Heaton is now the matriarch of her own family that's almost as large as the one
she grew up with. In 1990, she married producer and character actor David Hunt,
and they have four sons who are now all grown up.
The first time that a lot of TV viewers took notice of Patricia Heaton was probably in 1989,
when she scored the recurring role of oncologist Dr. Silverman on the popular ABC drama
thirtysomething. Before that, she'd been acting professionally, or trying to, for about a decade,
with small roles on shows like Matlock and Alien Nation. She also had a New York theatrical resume
that unfortunately wasn't doing her career any favors. As she told Entertainment Tonight in 2019,
"When I had been in New York for about nine years [...] I just couldn't get arrested! I
had to produce my own plays in order for me to hire myself."
Heaton decided to ditch theater in favor of screen work,
which necessitated a move to Los Angeles and an ultimatum for herself. As she explained,
"That was sort of my last ditch [effort]. I was saying, 'If something doesn't happen,
or start happening, in two years, I need to go back to school and get a
degree that's worth something. And try to make something of my life."
Fortunately, she landed those aforementioned TV jobs,
so there was no need to start filling out those grad school applications.
Very few American sitcoms have ever made it to the 200-episode milestone,
but Patricia Heaton can brag that she anchored two of them: Everybody Loves Raymond, which aired 210
installments, and The Middle, which made it to 215. Those are both big hits in terms of volume
and endurance, but Heaton had to make her way through flop after flop before she got there. In
1992, she landed her first main cast role, as the daughter and roommate of Alice star Linda Lavin on
ABC's Room for Two. A comeback vehicle for Lavin, the show lasted only two seasons and 26 episodes.
A year after Room for Two ended, Heaton was back on TV on the NBC blended-family sitcom
Someone Like Me, which disappeared from airwaves after only five episodes in the spring of 1994.
Within a year of that cancellation, Heaton was back on another sitcom,
CBS' Women of the House. On this spinoff of Designing Women,
Heaton played an adversarial administrative assistant to Delta Burke's Suzanne Sugarbaker,
who had inherited a congressional seat. That one lasted a mere 12 episodes.
"Excuse me, but attempting to profit from a government enterprise is a federal offense,
and we are all right now, at this very moment, unindicted co-conspirators."
The role of Debra Barone, the exasperated wife of a self-absorbed sportswriter whose meddlesome
parents and brother live across the street, launched Heaton to fame, fortune, and two
Emmy wins. But landing the part was hardly a sure thing, as her audition for the show was chaotic,
rushed, and strange. As she revealed on a 2010 episode of PBS' Backstage With…,
"I got this audition at the last minute for Raymond [...] My babysitter was in college,
and she needed to get to class. I said, 'I promise you I'm going to be right back;
please just stay.' And I ran over there. And I was kind of, you know, frazzled and hassled and,
you know, mad at my husband for something [...] And that all worked perfectly for this part."
"Maybe I don't want to think that my husband, who I'm married to, would like to live with a monkey."
"Well, maybe I would."
"Well, maybe I do."
After asking nicely to skip ahead of the 20 other women waiting to audition so she
could relieve her babysitter, Heaton got frustrated that the director and
producer wouldn't let her read her lines and just instead kept chatting with her.
Then they brought in star and co-creator Ray Romano, but Heaton didn't know who he was,
and she thought he was taking coffee orders. Finally, she read her lines fast and got out
of there quickly. That might not sound too promising, but, as she recalled,
"The next thing I know, I was being called in to meet the
president of CBS at the time [...] and read for him and got the part."
Besides Everybody Loves Raymond, Patricia Heaton is probably best known for her role as
beleaguered, cash-strapped Midwestern mom Frankie Heck on The Middle, which ran on ABC for nine
seasons from 2009 to 2018. It was a star vehicle for Heaton but that was only after a false start,
another try, and some recasting. A previous pilot for The Middle was filmed back in 2006,
with Ricki Lake playing Frankie, but ABC didn't order it to series.
As The Middle co-creator Eileen Heisler revealed to the Chicago Tribune in 2012,
"Patty was always our type, but we didn't allow ourselves to dream."
At the time that the original Middle went into production, Heaton was attached to another pilot,
an untitled series from Saturday Night Live writer Christine Zander about a newly widowed woman who
joins the PTA. That show didn't get picked up either, and Heaton's next series, Back to You,
didn't make it past the 2007-2008 season. Thus, she was available when Heisler and
her writing partner DeAnn Heline decided to give The Middle another shot. Once Heaton was onboard,
ABC greenlit a pilot, and The Middle was off and running.
"Somehow the life had been sucked right out of me. But who or what had sucked it?"
Over the course of her career as a recognizable TV star, Heaton's appearance
has changed somewhat. That's natural and to be expected, considering the natural passage of
time and all. But Heaton also underwent a few cosmetic surgical procedures. A lot of people,
particularly professional entertainers, get plastic surgery, but Heaton is one of the few
who readily admits to doing so, thereby helping to eliminate the taboo surrounding the topic.
In 2002, the actress told People Magazine that she'd had a tummy tuck and breast
reduction surgery after giving birth to four children. As for why she did it, she explained,
"Vanity. I mean it. Vanity. I had four C-sections and my stomach looked like a map of the world.
My breasts were hanging down to here from breastfeeding those babies."
More than a decade later, Heaton told People that she maintained her health
and kept her body how she wanted it through exercise and healthy eating,
though she had a little help as well. As she revealed,
"I love fillers and Botox, if you do it so that you still look like yourself,
you look like your best self."
Patricia Heaton isn't precious or self-conscious about her work. In fact,
she can enjoy Everybody Loves Raymond or The Middle just like any other TV viewer can. She's
not one of those actors who can't stand watching themselves. As she admitted to Us Weekly in 2018,
"If I come across [past shows] as I'm channel surfing, and I see [one I’m in],
I hate to say it. I will watch it. I think I'm fabulous."
There was one time when Heaton was on an airplane that offered Everybody
Loves Raymond as part of its in-flight entertainment, and, as she recalled,
"I was watching, had my headphones on, and I was laughing out loud [...] And the
steward came by and he said, 'I just think it's so cute you laugh at your own show.'"
But just because Heaton loves her two big sitcoms doesn't mean that she wants them to return to TV.
With the industry rebooting seemingly every 90s and 2000s hit, she has spoken out against
the idea of an Everybody Loves Raymond revival, particularly in light of the passings of Peter
Boyle and Doris Roberts. She also had no plans to participate in a spinoff of The Middle that
was set to focus on the young adult adventures of relentlessly optimistic middle child Sue Heck.
Alas, nobody will be appearing on that show, as ABC passed on Sue Sue in the City in 2018.
Raised in a Catholic family and converting to Presbyterianism as an adult,
religion is important to Heaton. Her faith has informed her conservative political views,
which have occasionally generated a bit of controversy. This was clear in 2020,
when she took to Twitter and accused the Democratic Party of having, quote, "a barbaric
platform that champions abortion for any reason through all nine months funded by taxpayers."
And back in 2012, Heaton criticized Sandra Fluke, a Georgetown University law student
whom congressional Republicans barred from testifying in support of health
insurance companies paying for contraceptives. As she tweeted,
"Hey G-Town: stop buying toothpaste, soap,
and shampoo! You'll save money, and no one will want to sleep with you!"
Heaton later apologized. Another incident occurred in 2006 when actor Michael J. Fox,
who has Parkinson's disease, appeared in a commercial asking Missouri voters to
approve a stem cell research ballot measure. Heaton and other conservative celebrities then
appeared in a response ad arguing that opening up stem cell research would lead
to women selling their eggs to fertility clinics. Heaton later regretted the ad,
as she told The New York Times that it was a, quote, "disaster." Though Heaton is conservative,
she has made it clear that she does not support Donald Trump. As she tweeted in February 2016,
"If he's the nominee then it won't be my party."
And on January 6, 2021, after Trump supporters invaded the United States Capitol building,
Heaton tweeted that she would be changing her party affiliation to independent.
Faith inspires not only Heaton's political leanings, but also where she chooses to donate
her time and money. She has contributed to such organizations as the Red Cross,
Alliance for Children's Rights, Operation Gratitude, and Heifer International.
Heaton's passion for helping others is especially clear in her work with World Vision.
After the 2004 tsunami in Southeast Asia, she appeared in literature for the foundation,
urging donations to help bring "life's basics" to people in the developing world. World Vision is
a faith-based charity that assists people in about 100 countries. It focuses on providing
pumps to provide clean water in underserved areas and building schools for children,
often setting up facilities for a decade or more to help ensure lasting change.
Heaton is World Vision's first celebrity ambassador, and she's more than just
a mouthpiece. She's gotten involved on the ground level by personally sponsoring
multiple children and traveling to various World Vision sites, including a Syrian refugee camp.
"World Vision is a great organization to be involved with,
and, um, they do so much great work all over the world, and they really help moms everywhere."
In 2020, Patricia Heaton wrapped production on Carol's Second Act,
the one-season CBS sitcom in which she starred as a woman switching career
paths later in life. That same year, the actress released Your Second Act,
a collection of essays about women who have managed to reinvent themselves.
"Interestingly enough, it was inspired by my now-cancelled TV show Carol's Second Act."
Heaton herself had undergone a bit of a personal transformation, as she gave up alcohol in 2018,
shortly after she turned 60. She told Parade Magazine,
"There's an actual statistic that women who were moderate drinkers in their 30s and 40s
often become alcoholics in their 50s and 60s [...] You're a little bit at sea, and so you
reach for the bottle to dull the uncertainty. I sensed that a bit with myself [...] I’ve stopped,
and my life has improved significantly. My kids are in their mid-20s and I’ll
probably be in my 70s by the time I have grandchildren. I want to be healthy for them."
If you or anyone you know is struggling with addiction issues,
help is available. Visit the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration
website or contact SAMHSA's National Helpline at 1-800-662-HELP (4357).