The Nanny's Cast Is Unrecognizable Now

A romantic, will-they-or-won't-they sitcom and a family show rolled into one, "The Nanny" became one of the biggest television hits of the 1990s. Fran Drescher starred as the abrasive-voiced, down on her luck Fran Fine, hired to work for the desperate, stuffy, and wealthy Sheffield family as the children's caretaker. Sparks flew between Miss Fine and single father Mr. Sheffield, which slowly played out amidst Fran's fish-out-of-water hijinks and her efforts to serve as a mother figure to three flailing kids.

After 145 episodes as a top 20 ratings hit and the Monday night anchor for CBS' primetime lineup, "The Nanny" went off the air in 1999, wrapping up all its storylines and sending its characters and the actors who played them off to do other things. Many of the actors were just launching their careers, while others were wrapping them up or looking to a life outside of show business. At any rate, a long time has passed since "The Nanny," one of the '90s TV shows we still love and watch today, concluded, and as the years have ticked by, the cast has evolved and aged. Here's a look at what the large cast of "The Nanny" has been up to over the past 25 years or so, and how they've changed so much to the point that they're hard to spot.

Fran Drescher appeared in the cult classics "UHF" and "This Is Spinal Tap" before breaking through with "The Nanny," which she co-created, in 1993. Drescher parlayed her broad comic persona and unforgettable voice and laugh as Fran Fine, a former bridal store employee with no child-rearing skills or experience who winds up the live-in caretaker for a desperate, wealthy dad.

Launched to fame and the A-list of television stars by "The Nanny," the twice Emmy-nominated Drescher went on to become a major Hollywood player. She starred in and wrote for the sitcom "Living with Fran" and hosted "The Fran Drescher Show" before leading the cast of the TV Land sitcom "Happily Divorced." Making light of the sometimes tragic history of divorce, Drescher and ex-husband Peter Marc Jacobson mined their own experience to create the comedy about a married couple who split up after the husband comes out as a gay man. In 2002, Drescher published "Cancer Schmancer," a memoir of her experience with tough-to-diagnose uterine cancer, and then created a cancer research foundation named after the book. In 2021, Drescher was elected president of SAG-AFTRA, the U.S.'s largest and most powerful labor union for actors. In 2023, she led a performers' labor stoppage that lasted for four months, the biggest since the 1945 strike that brought Hollywood to a screeching halt.

On "The Nanny," the comic foil for the outrageous nanny named Fran was her complete opposite and employer, the uptight English theater producer, single father of three children, and eventual and inevitable love interest, Mr. Maxwell Sheffield.

Portraying such an exceptionally upper-crust British character wasn't much of a stretch for actor Charles Shaughnessy, because in real life, he's an actual member of the U.K.'s lauded nobility. Upon the death of his cousin, 4th Lord Michael James Shaughnessy, in 2007, Shaughnessy inherited the title and became the 5th Baron Shaughnessy. The peerage-possessing actor remained in the U.S., however, pursuing his successful acting career. He's shown up in more than 100 movies and TV series, including arcs on "Mad Men" and "The Magicians" but more often as a voice performer in cartoons such as "The Tale of Despereaux" and "Pound Puppies" and as a soap opera star. Besides recurring on "The Bay" as Captain Elliot Sanders, Shaughnessy appeared in more than 1,100 episodes of "Days of Our Lives" as Shane and Drew Donovan and spent years on "General Hospital" as Victor Cassadine. 

Every sitcom about a rich family needs a sassy butler prone to delivering acerbic, withering, and perfect putdowns, and on "The Nanny," that role was filled by a British servant named Niles. Tasked with making sure everything runs smoothly for Mr. Sheffield and his three children, the mononymous Niles truly came alive during his frequent and always brutal verbal spar-offs with his boss's business partner, C.C. Babcock.

Daniel Davis is a chameleonic character actor, and after the Arkansas-born performer finished playing the respectable Niles on "The Nanny" in 1999, he portrayed a lot of authoritative figures on a variety of television shows. He played professors on "The Good Fight" and "Star Trek: Picard," doctors on "Elsbeth," "Frasier," and "Ugly Betty," and a servant once more on "Gotham." After "The Nanny," Davis returned to the New York stage, where he'd starred in the original cast of "Amadeus," and appeared in Broadway productions of "The Frogs," "The Invention of Love," "La Cage aux Folles," "Noises Off," and "Wrong Mountain," which earned the actor a Tony Award nomination for Best Featured Actor in a Play in 2000.

C.C. Babcock generally served the role of the hapless patsy or the butt of the joke on "The Nanny." Forever pining after her producing partner, Mr. Sheffield, she lobbed insults at Fran Fine, her seemingly lower-classed and outmatched designated romantic opponent, only to receive them back in a much more voluminous way from household staffer Niles.

Apart from an episode of the short-lived 1999 sitcom "Partners" and two short films shot 18 years apart, actor Lauren Lane left screen acting behind after "The Nanny" finished its run in the 1990s. She moved to Austin and joined that city's theatrical scene while teaching dramatic arts at Texas State University and acting with troupes such as ZACH Theatre, the Rude Mechs, and the Actors Theatre of Louisville, starring in the major outside-New York premieres of Tony Award-winning works such as "God of Carnage" and "Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike." Lane split from her husband, still hangs out with her close friend and TV nemesis Daniel Davis, and teamed up with designer Ben Shepard to create a series of handbags.

An entitled rich kid embittered and made sensitive over his mother's death, Brighton Sheffield changes the most over the span of "The Nanny" thanks to Fran's influence. Brighton is defensive and rude at first, but that persona slowly dissipates as he grows up and learns to accept his nanny and treat his blood relatives better.

A successful juvenile actor with a six-year run on a network sitcom, Benjamin Salisbury chose not to move into more adult roles after growing up over the course of "The Nanny" while co-starring as Brighton Sheffield. A child star who completely disappeared, Salisbury acted very little in the years after playing Brighton Sheffield ran its course, landing small roles in the films "S1m0ne" and "Red Zone," an episode of "Numb3rs," and the short "On the Brink." He hasn't acted professionally on-screen in any capacity since 2006, the year Salisbury married. He helped raise his three children while working as the general director of the Universal Studios Hollywood amusement park.

Fran Fine's status as a gregarious social butterfly comes in handy when raising the Sheffield kids, particularly teenager Maggie. Shy, unsure, and goofy at first, Maggie utilizes her nanny as a mentor figure to learn to be more confident and social.

Toward the end of her run as Maggie Sheffield on "The Nanny," Nicholle Tom was cast as Supergirl and Kara Kent in "The New Batman Adventures," and she'd play that dual voice role in numerous DC Comics-based animated projects over the next decade while continuing to act in live-action television shows and indie movies. Notably playing young reporter Cassie in "The Princess Diaries," Tom had a regular role on the short-lived lottery drama "Windfall" and co-starred on the boozy, dark Hollywood satire "The Minor Accomplishments of Jackie Woodman." Tom continues to pop up for an episode or two on network and cable shows and last headlined the 2022 Tubi romantic drama "Prisoner of Love."

The youngest of the Sheffield brood, Grace is sweet and innocent but precocious. She takes to the unproven Fran immediately but is also far ahead of the rest of her much older family members in terms of intelligence and vocabulary.

Eight years old when "The Nanny" began and 14 when it wrapped up in 1999, Madeline Zima quickly transitioned out of child-star roles such as Grace Sheffield and into more mature projects. After showing up in teen-oriented fare such as "7th Heaven," "Gilmore Girls," and "A Cinderella Story," Zima joined the cast of the popular superhero series "Heroes" in 2009 playing the college roommate and secret admirer of cheerleader Claire. Zima also portrayed Mia Lewis across four seasons of the Showtime comedy "Californication," co-starring as the underaged and very ill-advised affair partner of the lascivious main character. Following a run on the Prime Video series "Betas," Zima appeared in the "Twin Peaks" reboot and in 2018 wrote and directed the short film "Warm Human Magic" and briefly played Space Case on the superhero series "Doom Patrol."

Fran Fine pretty much takes over the Sheffield townhouse on "The Nanny," frequently inviting over her obnoxious relatives, including her mother, Sylvia FIne. Meddling in the affairs of her daughter and often over-reaching, Sylvia was the source of much humor thanks to her constant eating and screeching encouragement for Fran to pursue Mr. Sheffield.

By the time Renée Taylor began playing Fran Fine's mother on "The Nanny," she was an accomplished actor and writer. With her husband and collaborator Joseph Bologna, Taylor was nominated for screenwriting at the Oscars in 1971 for "Lovers and Other Strangers," and she memorably played Eva Braun in the play-within-a-movie in "The Producers." In 2018, Taylor staged the play "My Life on a Diet," which she co-wrote with her husband, in New York and then toured it nationally. (Bologna died in 2017.) Along with roles in dozens of TV shows, after "The Nanny," Taylor put her theatrically high-pitched and shrill timbre to work, voicing a tortoise in "Dr. Dolittle 2," Mrs. Start in "Ice Age: The Meltdown," and Gloria on "Bob's Burgers."

"The Nanny" would occasionally experiment with the classic sitcom comedy duo formula. Fran Fine's partner in hijinks and adventuring that didn't go well was Val Toriello, her long-standing best friend from her pre-Sheffield life who kept her grounded through Val's hilarious lack of common sense and romantic success.

Before, during, and after her recurring six-year run as Val on "The Nanny," Rachel Chagall acted only sporadically. She received a Golden Globe nomination for her 1987 screen debut, "Gaby: A True Story," and after a few other supporting roles, landed the recurring part of Val on "The Nanny." She later appeared on episodes of "Just Shoot Me!," "Strong Medicine," and "What I Like About You" before retiring from acting altogether in 2006. Chagall's workload has been limited by Guillain-Barré Syndrome, an autoimmune condition affecting the nervous system that causes vibrations, weakness, and eventual near or total paralysis. Off-screen, Chagall raised twins with her husband Greg Lenert, the stage manager of "The Nanny."

Another member of Fran's family who often overstayed their welcome at the Sheffield house was her grandmother, Yetta Rosenberg. Impossibly old, never quite aware of what's going on, and often stuck in the past, Grandma Yetta had a hard time remembering most things.

Makeup was extensively employed to transform Ann Morgan Guilbert into Yetta Rosenberg, a positively ancient character a few decades older than the actor who portrayed her. Very active in TV and theater in the decades before "The Nanny" — she appeared in "Billy Barnes Revue" on Broadway in 1959 and recurred on "The Dick Van Dyke Show" in the 1960s as neighbor Millie — Guilbert continued to grace stage and screen after "The Nanny" ended in 1999. She appeared on episodes of "Curb Your Enthusiasm," "Law and Order: SVU," "Grey's Anatomy," "Getting On," and "Happily Divorced" (opposite her TV granddaughter, Fran Drescher), and featured prominently in the 2010 indie movie "Please Give" and the 2005 Broadway comedy "A Naked Girl on the Appian Way." She played a grandmother on the sitcom "Life in Pieces" in 2016, just weeks before she joined the list of '90s sitcom stars who died tragically, dying from cancer at age 87. 

In Seasons 4 and 5 of "The Nanny," Fran Fine, at the behest of her boss, seeks out the help of the relationship-focused Dr. Miller to end her man-chasing ways. He diagnoses the nanny as harboring an unhealthy fixation on marriage.

Taped in Los Angeles but set in New York, "The Nanny" re-created that city's flavor by hiring theatrical veterans. One such performer was Spalding Gray, an acclaimed stage artist best known for his dramatic monologues, including "Gray's Anatomy," "It's a Slippery Slope," and "Monster in a Box." As nine episodes of "The Nanny" gave Gray a lot of exposure, he parlayed that boost into a starring role in a 2000 Broadway revival of Gore Vidal's hit play "The Best Man." After playing Dr. Miller, Gray played similar physician and professor roles in 2000s movies including "Kate and Leopold" and "How High." In January 2004, Gray, diagnosed with depression, was reported missing by his family. Two months later, a body discovered in the East River outside New York City was identified as Gray, and authorities determined that he died by suicide. He was 62 years old.

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