Helen Siff

Acting

Helen Siff

Born — Died

1937-01-01 — 2025-12-18

Place of birth

Woodmere, Long Island, New York, USA

Known for

Acting

Credits

39 titles

Helen Siff (June 2, 1937 – December 18, 2025) was an American character actress. She was known for roles in numerous films including The Karate Kid (1984), You Don't Mess with the Zohan (2008), and Hail, Caesar! (2016). She was born in Woodmere, New York, on June 2, 1937. She died from complications of surgery in Los Angeles on December 18, 2025, at the age of 88.

Known for

Film credits

2010s · 3 titles

1990s · 3 titles

1980s · 9 titles

The Karate Kid poster
7.2

New Jersey teen Daniel LaRusso moves to Los Angeles with his mother, and soon strikes up a relationship with Ali. He quickly finds himself the target of bullying by a group of thugs, led by Ali's ex-boyfriend Johnny, who study karate at the Cobra Kai dojo under ruthless sensei John Kreese. Fortunately, Daniel befriends Mr. Miyagi, an unassuming repairman who just happens to be a martial arts master himself. Miyagi takes Daniel under his wing, training him in a more compassionate form of karate for self-defense and, later, preparing him to compete against the brutal Cobra Kai.

The Karate Kid

1984

Earth Girls Are Easy poster
5.6

In this musical comedy, Valerie is dealing with her philandering fiancé, Ted, when she finds that a trio of aliens have crashed their spaceship into her swimming pool. Once the furry beings are shaved at her girlfriend's salon, the women discover three handsome men underneath. After absorbing the native culture via television, the spacemen are ready to hit the dating scene in 1980s Los Angeles.

Earth Girls Are Easy

1988

Big Top Pee-wee poster
5.0

Paul Reubens stars as Pee-wee Herman in his second full-length film about a farmer who joins the circus after a storm drops a big tent in his front yard. Pee-wee, along with an outlandish cast of animals and circus performers, puts on the best show ever.

Big Top Pee-wee

1988

White Dog poster
6.6

Samuel Fuller’s throat-grabbing exposé on American racism was misunderstood and withheld from release when it was made in the early eighties.Today, the notorious film is lauded for its daring metaphor and gripping pulp filmmaking. Kristy McNichol stars as a young actress who adopts a lost German shepherd, only to discover through a series of horrifying incidents that the dog has been trained to attack black people, and Paul Winfield plays the animal trainer who tries to cure him. A snarling, uncompromising vision, White Dog is a tragic portrait of the evil done by that most corruptible of all animals; the human being.

White Dog

1982

For Keeps poster
6.5

Young high school couple Darcy Elliot and Stan Bobrucz are one year from graduation, with promising futures ahead of them. But their paths take a drastic turn when Darcy becomes pregnant. Unwilling to go through an abortion or an adoption — despite their parents' pleas — Darcy and Stan decide to sacrifice their college experiences and degrees in order to keep and raise the baby. After a quick marriage, the two realize it won't be as easy as they thought.

For Keeps

1988

Blood Vows: The Story of a Mafia Wife poster
8.0

A fashion designer marries a lawyer only to discover that his father is an imfamous mafia don.

Blood Vows: The Story of a Mafia Wife

1987

There Must Be a Pony poster
6.8

Marguerite Sydney is a celebrated Hollywood star attempting a comeback after a stay in a mental hospital, as well as trying to re-establish a relationship with her teenage son, and risking a romance with a mysterious stranger.

There Must Be a Pony

1986

Lots of Luck poster
7.5

A middle-aged Annette Funicello stars in this made-for-Disney film about a blue-collar family whose lives are forever transformed when they win the lottery.

Lots of Luck

1985

Her Secret Life poster
5.8

Kate Capshaw plays a schoolteacher and suburban housewife who happens to be an ex-spy. Nobody knows of Capshaw's previous espionage activities, least of all her somewhat obtuse husband Cliff De Young. When Capshaw's ex-lover Jeroen Krabbe, an intimate of Castro, lands in a Cuban prison, she is swept back into the spy business, leaving her nonplussed hubby in the dust.

Her Secret Life

1987

Series credits

Modern Family poster
7.9

The Pritchett-Dunphy-Tucker clan is a wonderfully large and blended family. They give us an honest and often hilarious look into the sometimes warm, sometimes twisted, embrace of the modern family.

Modern Family

2009

S.W.A.T. poster
8.0

A Los Angeles S.W.A.T. sergeant is assigned to lead a highly skilled unit in the community where he grew up. Torn between loyalty to the streets, where the cops are sometimes the enemy, and allegiance to his brothers in blue, he strategically straddles the two worlds.

S.W.A.T.

2017

Curb Your Enthusiasm poster
8.1

The off-kilter, unscripted comic vision of Larry David, who plays himself in a parallel universe in which he can't seem to do anything right, and, by his standards, neither can anyone else.

Curb Your Enthusiasm

2000

Scrubs poster
8.2

In the unreal world of Sacred Heart Hospital, John "J.D." Dorian learns the ways of medicine, friendship and life.

Scrubs

2001

Married... with Children poster
7.7

Al Bundy is an unsuccessful middle aged shoe salesman with a miserable life and an equally dysfunctional family. He hates his job, his wife is lazy, his son is dysfunctional (especially with women), and his daughter is dim-witted and promiscuous.

Married... with Children

1987

Married... with Children poster
7.7

Al Bundy is an unsuccessful middle aged shoe salesman with a miserable life and an equally dysfunctional family. He hates his job, his wife is lazy, his son is dysfunctional (especially with women), and his daughter is dim-witted and promiscuous.

Married... with Children

1987

Will & Grace poster
6.9

Will Truman and Grace Adler are best friends living in New York, and when Grace's engagement falls apart, she moves in with Will. Together, along with their friends, they go through the trials of dating, sex, relationships and their careers, butting heads at times but ultimately supporting one another while exchanging plenty of witty banter along the way.

Will & Grace

1998

Mom poster
7.3

Aan irreverent and outrageous take on true family love‐and dysfunction. Newly sober single mom Christy struggles to raise two children in a world full of temptations and pitfalls. Testing her sobriety is her formerly estranged mother, now back in Christy's life and eager to share passive-aggressive insights into her daughter's many mistakes.

Mom

2013

Knots Landing poster
6.9

The domestic adventures, misdeeds and everyday interactions of five families living on a cul-de-sac in a small California community.

Knots Landing

1979

Strong Medicine poster
7.4

The lives of staff in the womens' health clinic of a fictitious hospital in Philadelphia.

Strong Medicine

2000

Mad About You poster
6.8

Young, urban newlyweds Paul and Jamie Buchman try to sustain their marital bliss while sidestepping the hurdles of love in the '90s.

Mad About You

1992

My Name Is Earl poster
7.6

When petty criminal Earl Hickey wins the lottery, he sets off on a quest to repair his questionable karma.

My Name Is Earl

2005

Spin City poster
7.0

Workaholic Mike Flaherty is the Deputy Mayor of New York City, serving as Mayor Randall Winston's key strategist and much-needed handler. Mike runs the city with the help of his oddball staff: an anxious and insecure press secretary; a sexist, boorish chief of staff; an impeccably groomed gay activist running minority affairs; a sharp and efficient, man-crazy accountant; and an idealistic young speechwriter. Like Mike, they are all professionally capable but personally challenged.

Spin City

1996

Felicity poster
6.6

Felicity Porter, a sensitive and intelligent girl from the San Francisco Bay Area, decides to give up a slot at Stanford University's pre-med program to follow her long time crush to college in New York City. Things get even more complicated when she meets her dorm's resident advisor and they fall in love.

Felicity

1998

Good Trouble poster
7.4

After moving to The Coterie in Downtown Los Angeles, Callie and Mariana Foster realize that living on their own is not all that it’s cracked up to be.

Good Trouble

2019

Sister, Sister poster
7.0

Twins Tia Landry and Tamera Campbell were separated and adopted at birth. Fourteen years later, they encounter each other by chance at the mall. After the families meet, Tia's widowed father agrees to let Tamera and her single mother move in with them.

Sister, Sister

1994

Ellen poster
6.2

Ellen works in a Los Angeles bookstore called Buy the Book and hangs around with her friends discussing lovers, work and family.

Ellen

1994

Lou Grant poster
7.4

The trials of a former television station manager turned newspaper city editor, and his journalist staff.

Lou Grant

1977

Doogie Howser, M.D. poster
6.6

Doogie Howser is a doctor. He is also a 16-year-old genius who graduated college at age 10 and finished medical school at age 14. But he is still a teenager, with normal teenage friends and problems. But unlike a normal teenager, he is just learning to drive while also consulting on serious medical cases like heart transplants.

Doogie Howser, M.D.

1989

Beyond Belief: Fact or Fiction poster
7.3

Can you tell the difference between fact and fiction? Several stories of strange, mysterious and incredible occurrences are chronicled during each episode. It is up to the viewer to decide which stories actually happened and which were completely fabricated by the show’s writers. The answer is revealed by Jonathan Frakes at the conclusion of each episode.

Beyond Belief: Fact or Fiction

1997

The Tracy Morgan Show poster
8.8

A family man who lives in a small Brooklyn apartment with his wife and two kids deals with the daily headaches of working at an auto garage while dreaming of expanding the business.

The Tracy Morgan Show

2003

Murder in Texas poster
6.7

A plastic surgeon was suspected of causing the death of his first wife, the daughter of a wealthy member of Houston society. The doctor then marries his mistress, whom he had been keeping during his marriage. His former father-in-law, convinced that his daughter was murdered, determines to see the doctor punished.

Murder in Texas

1981