Tovah Feldshuh
Feldshuh in 2016
Born	Terri Sue Feldshuh (1948-12-27)December 27, 1948 (age 77) Manhattan, New York City, U.S.
Alma mater	Sarah Lawrence College
Occupations	Actress, singer, playwright
Years active	1973–present
Spouse	Andrew Harris Levy ​ (m. 1977)​
Children	2
Relatives	David Feldshuh(brother) Noah Feldshuh(nephew)

Terri Sue "Tovah" Feldshuh (born December 27, 1948)^[1] is an American actress, singer, and playwright. She has been aBroadway star for fifty years, earning fourTony Award nominations. She has also received twoEmmy Award nominations forHolocaust andLaw & Order, and appeared in such films asA Walk on the Moon,She's Funny That Way, andKissing Jessica Stein. In 2015–2016, she played the role ofDeanna Monroe onAMC's television adaptation ofThe Walking Dead.

Feldshuh is Jewish, the daughter of Lillian (née Kaplan) and Sidney Feldshuh, who was a lawyer.^[2] Her brotherDavid Feldshuh is thePulitzer Prize–nominated playwright ofMiss Evers' Boys.

She was raised inScarsdale, New York, inWestchester County, and graduated fromSarah Lawrence College. In her high-school years, she was a student at the National Music Camp (later named theInterlochen Arts Camp) as a star in their drama class. She studied acting atHB Studio^[3] in New York City.She started her career under theater director Michael Langham at theGuthrie Theater, where she was awarded the McKnight Fellowship in Acting.^[4]

Feldshuh appeared on the stage under the name "Terri Fairchild" before deciding to incorporate her Hebrew name and her original surname as her professional name, Tovah Feldshuh. She said of her name changes: "I fell in love with a Christian boy, Michael Fairchild, who didn't want to kiss a Terri Sue. He said: 'Terri Sue doesn't fit you at all. What's that other name of yours? Tovah? Now that's a name!"^[5] In 1994, she joked that she could have changed her name to "Goody Two-shoes", sincetovah isHebrew for "good", whileFeldshuh translates from German as "field shoe".^[6]

She made herBroadway debut in the short-lived 1973 musicalCyrano starringChristopher Plummer. She appeared in the titular role inYentl both off-Broadway at theChelsea Theater Center and later on Broadway. Both productions are detailed in the book,Chelsea on the Edge: The Adventures of an American Theater, which describes tensions between Feldshuh and directorRobert Kalfin over the play's interpretation.^[7]

Her other Broadway credits includeSaravá,Lend Me a Tenor, andGolda's Balcony -William Gibson's work about the late Israeli Prime MinisterGolda Meir.Golda's Balcony set a record as the longest-running one-woman play in Broadway history on January 2, 2005.^[8]

Feldshuh made hercabaret debut at theAlgonquin Hotel Oak Room with her act,Tovah: Crossovah! From Broadway to Cabaret, which was followed byTovah: Out of Her Mind! She took the latter show on the road to Philadelphia, Dallas, Houston, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Chicago, Hong Kong, and Sydney. TheWest End production sold out an eight-week run at theDuke of York's Theatre. TheBoston Globe selected her as Best Cabaret Artist of 2000.^[9] In 2000, she co-wrote and performed in a one-woman play about actressTallulah Bankhead titledTallulah Hallelujah!^[10]

She returned to Broadway in theDan Gordon playIrena's Vow in March 2009. She had appeared off-Broadway in this play in September 2008.^[11] In 2012, Feldshuh performed as Mama Rose in a revival ofGypsy.^[12]

At the September 21, 2013, Broadway performance ofPippin,Andrea Martin's last performance as Berthe (Pippin's grandmother) was announced to be the following day, and Feldshuh would be subsequently taking over the role. In 2014, she starred inGypsy at the Bristol Riverside Theatre as Mama Rose.^[13][14]

In February 2015, she performed a one-woman show that she calledAging Is Optional at54 Below.^[15]

In July 2022, it was announced that Feldshuh would replaceJane Lynch as Mrs. Brice in the Broadway revival ofFunny Girl, beginning September 6, 2022.^[16]

In 1973, Feldshuh appeared on television in a supporting role inScream, Pretty Peggy. In 1976, she also had a supporting role inRyan's Hope, and in the following year, she playedKatharine Hepburn inThe Amazing Howard Hughes. Also in 1977, she appeared onThe Bob Newhart Show as Veronica Kidd, in an episode called "The Heartbreak Kidd" (season five, episode 18), which aired February 5. However, Feldshuh came to international prominence as Helena Slomova in the 1978 miniseriesHolocaust, based onGerald Green's novel. Between 1991 and 2007, Feldshuh had a recurring role as defense attorneyDanielle Melnick onNBC'sLaw & Order. In 2017, Feldshuh reprised her role as Melnick, who was by then a Cook County judge, inDick Wolf'sChicago Justice, a companion program to hisChicago Fire,Chicago P.D., andChicago Med that was situated primarily in the Cook County, Illinois, court system.^[17]

Feldshuh's feature-film appearances have includedLady in the Water,The Triangle Factory Fire Scandal,A Walk on the Moon,Happy Accidents,Brewster's Millions,The Idolmaker,The Blue Iguana,A Day in October,The Believer,Love Comes Lately,Just My Luck, andKissing Jessica Stein. She also appeared as Ruthie in the 2004 filmThe Tollbooth.

Feldshuh appeared inGoyband, co-starringAdam Pascal,Amy Davidson,Cris Judd,Dean Edwards, Tibor Feldman, andNatasha Lyonne. She was also slated to star in the psychological thrillerActs of Mercy. In 2009, Feldshuh recorded the song "Bein Nahar Prat" forPioneers for a Cure, with the proceeds benefiting Ellen's Run.

In 2012, she appeared asMossad agent Rivka in theCovert Affairs episode "Wishful Beginnings". In 2014, she appeared in the filmShe's Funny That Way.

In March 2015, Feldshuh made her debut in a starring role onAMC's highly ratedThe Walking Dead. Feldshuh had never seen the show before being cast as former politician Deanna Monroe, whose character Feldshuh says she based onHillary Clinton.^[18] She also appeared in the six-part miniseriesFlesh and Bone, which debuted in 2015 onStarz.

From 2015 to 2019, Feldshuh had a recurring role on the musical comedyCrazy Ex-Girlfriend as Naomi Bunch, the image-conscious and hypercritical mother of the show's main character, Rebecca Bunch, played byRachel Bloom.

In 2025, Tovah Feldshuh became the subject of a feature-length documentary film,Tovah, directed and produced byDavid Serero. Marking more than five decades of stage and screen work, the film traces Feldshuh’s career from her early Broadway appearances in the 1970s to later prominent projects in theatre, television, and cabaret. The star-studded film starsOscar Isaac,Dustin Hoffman,Kristen Bell,Patti LuPone,Stephen Schwartz,Peter Gallagher,Adam Brody,Rachel Bloom,Julie Benko, Jared Grimes,Daryl Roth, Chris Silbermann, Michael Adler,Daniel Roher,Elie Chouraqui,Katie Couric,Joy Behar,Erin Foster, Sharon Bialy,Julie Platt,David Fishelson, and more.^[19][20]

Feldshuh married New York attorney Andrew Harris Levy in 1977. ActressRuth Gordon was her maid of honor. They have a son, Garson, an economist and graduate ofHarvard andOxford universities; and a daughter, Amanda, who graduated from theMassachusetts Institute of Technology. When Amanda married in 2014, Feldshuh gave her the advice, "You know how to have a successful marriage? Shut one eye, and don't leave. Some of it's fun and some of it isn't. It can be challenging, but you do not leave the field of play."^[5][21] Her nephew Noah Feldshuh is a former member ofalternative rock bandX Ambassadors, having left the band after an indefinite hiatus beginning in 2016.^[22][23][24]

She lives on theUpper West Side ofManhattan.^[25]

For her charity work, she is the recipient of the Eleanor Roosevelt Humanities Award, Hadassah's Myrtle Wreath, and the Israel Peace Medal. TheNational Foundation for Jewish Culture honored her with the 2002 Jewish Image Award and the Performing Arts award in 2006.^[26][27]

When doing research for her role asIrene Gut Opdyke in the playIrena's Vow, Feldshuh traveled toBorshchiv,Ukraine, and discovered that her own ancestor, Moishe Feldshuh, had lived there in the early 20th century.^[5]

In March 2015, Feldshuh hikedMount Kilimanjaro with her son. She explained toVariety she was inspired after the 2014 death of her mother at age 103, and her own athletic role inPippin, in which she had to swing on a trapeze. "I really do feel we're only in this body once," she said. "I just want enough money to buy experience. I can forgo a dress, but the idea of taking a trip and trekking Mt. Kilimanjaro, or going on theTrans-Siberian railroad, or tracking lemurs inMadagascar — these things are very exciting to me. To see the world until I leave my own body. It's now or not at all."^[18]

• 1975: Honored as a Special Mention duringDrama Desk Awards^[41]

• Official website
• Tovah Feldshuh atIMDb
• Tovah Feldshuh at theInternet Broadway Database
• Tovah Feldshuh at theInternet Off-Broadway Database (archived)
• Tovah Feldshuh –Downstage Center interview atAmerican Theatre Wing.org
• Facebook site (official)

• 1948 births
• Living people
• Actresses from Manhattan
• 20th-century American dramatists and playwrights
• American film actresses
• American stage actresses
• American television actresses
• Drama Desk Award winners
• Jewish American actresses
• People from the Upper West Side
• Actors from Scarsdale, New York
• Sarah Lawrence College alumni
• American women dramatists and playwrights
• 20th-century American actresses
• 21st-century American actresses
• Writers from Manhattan
• Scarsdale High School alumni
• 20th-century American women writers
• 21st-century American Jews
• American Zionists
• Actresses from Westchester County, New York
• Interlochen Center for the Arts alumni

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