Virginia Gregg

Virginia Gregg was an American TV, film, and radio actor whose most notable role, as the voice of Norman Bates's mother in "Psycho," went uncredited for years. Gregg began her career as one of the most in-demand female radio actors of the 1940s. After appearing regularly on radio serials such as the western "Gunsmoke" and the comedy classic "The Jack Benny Program," Gregg initially tried her luck with small film roles but found greater success on television, finding numerous bit parts in live TV plays and variety shows. By the 1950s and '60s, Gregg had steady work as a character actor, regularly playing wives of murder victims or stalwart frontierswomen on shows such as the minimalist police drama "Dragnet" and the western "Rawhide." In 1960, Gregg was one of three uncredited voice actors to play the role of Norma Bates in Alfred Hitchcock's classic thriller "Psycho." She went on to perform the voice by herself in the critically-derided sequels "Psycho II" and "Psycho II" before succumbing to lung cancer in 1986.