Biography
Verna Bloom (also credited as Verna Frances Bloom) was an American actress. Born on 7 August 1938 in Lynn, Massachusetts, she graduated from Boston University’s School of Fine Arts in 1959 and trained at the Herbert Berghof Studio in New York. She made her Broadway debut in 1967 in The Persecution and Assassination of Jean-Paul Marat as Performed by the Inmates of the Asylum of Charenton Under the Direction of the Marquis de Sade.
Bloom’s film career began with Medium Cool (1969). She appeared in High Plains Drifter (1973), National Lampoon’s Animal House (1978) as Marion Wormer, Martin Scorsese’s After Hours (1985) as June, and The Last Temptation of Christ (1988) as Mary, Mother of Jesus. Her television credits include episodes of Bonanza (1969), Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman (1993) and The West Wing (2003). She was married to screenwriter Jay Cocks from 1972 until her death on 9 January 2019 in Bar Harbor, Maine.
