Rita Karin (born Rita Karpinowicz; October 24, 1919 – September 10, 1993) was a Polish-born American actress best known for her role as Jackie Mason's mother on the 1989 TV series ''

Chicken Soup Chicken soup is a soup made from chicken, simmered in water, usually with various other ingredients. The classic chicken soup consists of a clear chicken broth, often with pieces of chicken or vegetables; common additions are pasta, noodles, ...

''. She also appeared as

Meryl Streep Mary Louise Meryl Streep (born June 22, 1949) is an American actress. Often described as "the best actress of her generation", Streep is particularly known for her versatility and accent adaptability. She has received numerous accolades throu ...

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landlady who appears at the beginning of '' Sophie's Choice''. Her voice can be heard singing children's songs from the camps in the Holocaust Museum in Washington, D.C. Born to Moses Karpinowicz and Rachel Levitan in

Wilno Vilnius ( , ; see also #Etymology and other names, other names) is the capital and List of cities in Lithuania#Cities, largest city of Lithuania, with a population of 592,389 (according to the state register) or 625,107 (according to the munic ...

Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It is divided into 16 administrative provinces called voivodeships, covering an area of . Poland has a population of over 38 million and is the fifth-most populou ...

(present-day Vilnius, Lithuania), Rita and her husband, Norbert Horowitz, a graduate of the Moscow State Jewish Theater, create a Yiddish theater that performed for

Holocaust survivors Holocaust survivors are people who survived the Holocaust, defined as the persecution and attempted annihilation of the Jews by Nazi Germany and its allies before and during World War II in Europe and North Africa. There is no universally accep ...

throughout Europe. The couple emigrated in 1948 to the United States, where she acted in the

Yiddish Yiddish (, or , ''yidish'' or ''idish'', , ; , ''Yidish-Taytsh'', ) is a West Germanic language historically spoken by Ashkenazi Jews. It originated during the 9th century in Central Europe, providing the nascent Ashkenazi community with a ve ...

theater in

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. She and other actors read the works of

Sholom Aleichem ) , birth_date = , birth_place = Pereiaslav, Russian Empire , death_date = , death_place = New York City, U.S. , occupation = Writer , nationality = , period = , genre = Novels, sh ...

at the home of Bel Kaufman, Aleichem's granddaughter, each year on the anniversary of the writer's death.Profile
emory.edu; accessed February 12, 2016.

Death

Rita Karin died at 73 from undisclosed causes in New York City. She was survived by her son, Dr. Michael Horowitz, and daughter, Mrs. Rochelle Axelrod, and five grandchildren.
nytimes.com; accessed February 10, 2016.

Filmography

References

1919 births 1993 deaths 20th-century American actresses American film actresses American stage actresses American television actresses Actresses from Vilnius Polish emigrants to the United States {{US-tv-actor-1910s-stub