BARBARA COLTON: Pray With Your Feet

10 July 1938  –  4 April 2026

First Vice President of ACTORS’ EQUITY ASSOCIATION for four terms and serving in a variety of Equity leadership positions over nearly a quarter of a century, she fought for the rights of Actors and defended the rights of All People. My friend, BARBARA COLTON, passed away a couple of weeks ago. She was a True Woman of the Theatre and a Model Citizen!

She appeared onstage with Katharine Hepburn in A Matter of Gravity.

In recent years, BARBARA faced some of the challenges of aging, including the need to choose soft foods. I remembered that I had the recipe for Katharine Hepburn’s Brownies which Liz Smith had famously wrestled away from Ms. Hepburn and was given permission to publish in the 1980’s. They are a perfect Brownie: soft, melt-in-your-mouth fudgy, and delicious. I baked a batch, leaving out the nuts, and brought them to BARBARA, explaining that they would be very easy to eat. She lit up! “I’ve had these!” she exclaimed delighting in the bit of nostalgia and pointing to the tray of Brownies! Then she added, enthusiastically, “From Kate!”

“Well,” I replied, “You are the certainly the only person I know who could say that!” (more…)