One of the best TV shows of the ’90s, “The Nanny” ran for six seasons on CBS between 1993 and 1999 with Fran Drescher starring as the titular caregiver. Francine “Fran” Fine (Drescher) was flamboyant, outspoken, and free-spirited, the perfect juxtaposition to the very stuffy and reserved family she worked for.
This culture clash ended up being exactly what the Sheffields needed, as Fran helped to bring warmth and laughter back to the family’s household — and eventually, becoming a literal Sheffield herself.As it turns out, the real inspiration behind “The Nanny” came from a time when Drescher lived in London and babysat the child of famous supermodel Twiggy, whom Drescher had befriended when the pair worked together on the failed sitcom, “Princesses.”
The Sheffield family consists of patriarch Maxwell Sheffield (Charles Shaughnessy) and his three children, Maggie (Nicholle Tom), Brighton (Benjamin Salisbury), and Grace (Madeline Zima). There’s also the family’s butler, Niles (Daniel Davis), and Maxwell’s longtime business partner, C.C.
Babcock (Lauren Lane). Beyond the core seven-member ensemble, which remains intact for the sitcom’s entire run, there were three major recurring characters: Val Toriello (Rachel Chagall), Sylvia Fine (Renée Taylor), and Yetta Rosenberg-Jones (Ann Morgan Guilbert), who were Fran’s best friend, mother, and grandmother, respectively. What do all of these actors look like these days, and what have they been up to in the 20-plus years since “The Nanny” ended its Emmy-winning run? Read on and find out.
Daniel Davis
The snarky British Butler is a time-tested sitcom trope, and Niles can snark with the best of them. But what sets him apart from contemporaries like Geoffrey from “The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air” is that he didn’t seem to have disdain for his job or his client family. Niles was very protective of the Sheffields, and rather than treating the new nanny like competition, he quickly embraced Fran as both an ally and friend.
“The Nanny” wasn’t the only major television role for actor Daniel Davis. He had previously appeared in over 70 episodes of the NBC soap opera “Texas,” where he played Eliot Carrington, taking over the role from James Douglas, who originated the character on “Another World.”
Davis also famously played Sherlock Holmes’ rival Professor Moriarty in two episodes of “Star Trek: The Next Generation.” Decades later, he agreed to reprise his Moriarty role on “Star Trek: Picard.”Although the actor was much more prominent on the small screen, Davis does have a few notable films under his belt, including “The Hunt for Red October” and “The Prestige.”
Apart from his screen work, Davis is a prolific stage actor as well, with a career that stretches back to the 1960s. His most recent live theater credits include a 2019 production of “The Importance of Being Earnest,” and he was nominated for a Tony in 2000 for his work in “Wrong Mountain.”
Madeline Zima
The youngest of the three Sheffield children, Grace “Gracie” Sheffield was something of a Lisa Simpson type in that she was wise beyond her years — a trait that often frustrated not only her but also those around her. Gracie was not only the first of the children to embrace Fran, but she did so the hardest, up to and including helping to get Fran and Gracie’s father, Maxwell, together. Gracie made it clear pretty early on that she wanted Fran to be her stepmom, and she did everything she could to make sure that happened.
Gracie was portrayed by Madeline Zima, and “The Nanny” certainly provides the young actor with her breakout role. Zima remained extremely prolific in both film and on television after “The Nanny” ended, eventually landing the lead on Showtime’s “Californication” in addition to recurring roles on “Heroes,” “Betas,” and “Doom Patrol.” Among Zima’s recent gigs are parts in the films “Bombshell” and “Subservience” and appearances in the shows “High Potential,” “Hacks,” “NCIS: Hawai’i,” “You,” and “Good Girls.”
In 2018, While sitcoms don’t typically feature outright villains, there’s usually at least one antagonistic force among the ensemble that ends up spurring on much of the show’s conflict. On “The Nanny,” that role was filled by C.C. Babcock, Maxwell’s business partner. C.C. is portrayed as cold and conniving, wasting no time in trying to woo Maxwell after his wife died while her side of the bed was still warm. Throughout the series’ early seasons, she continued to pursue a romantic relationship with him despite the many reasons why it was inappropriate for her to do so.
She also couldn’t be bothered to remember the names of the Sheffield children and never stopped dismissively referring to Fran as “Nanny Fine,” even after Fran had become a genuine member of the Sheffield family and was no longer the children’s nanny.
Lauren Lane has never been a particularly prolific screen actor; outside of her role as C.C. on “The Nanny,” she was a main cast memberr for only a single season of the action series “Hunter” and had a very brief stint on “L.A. Law.” Beyond those roles and “The Nanny,” her television career consists of just a handful of single-episode appearances on various shows.
Similarly, you can count on one hand the number of movies she’s appeared in, and none of them are particularly well known. Where Lane has done the most acting work is on the stage, where she spent five years in Tim Robbins’ renowned theater company The Actor’s Gang as well as appearing in stage productions in California, Texas, and Kentucky. When she’s not acting, Lane is a tenured professor and a career coach.
Renée Taylor
With nearly 100 episodes under her belt, Fran’s mom, Sylvia Fine, was a pretty consistent presence on “The Nanny.” While she often played fast and loose with boundaries, Sylvia always had Fran’s best interests at heart and wanted nothing more than for her daughter to be happy. Sylvia also had a great relationship with the Sheffield kids and was immediately like a loving grandmother to them. She was based on Fran Drescher’s real mother, just as Morty Fine was based on her real father, though he only appeared in a few episodes of the show.
Veteran actor Renée Taylor already had over 30 years of acting roles under her belt when she took up the role of Sylvia — a role, it should be noted, that was initially played by Fran Drescher herself when Sylvia first appeared on the show via flashbacks to Fran’s childhood. Standout roles in Taylor’s impressive filmography include playing Eva Braun in the original 1967 version of “The Producers” and appearances on shows like “St. Elsewhere,” “The Love Boat,” and “Thirtysomething.” She’s also an accomplished writer, with numerous writing credits that include film, television, and live theater.
91 years old at the time of this writing, Taylor continues to act, appearing in a 2023 episode of Amazon’s Prime Video series “Upload” and having a role in the 2025 dramedy “Magic Hour.”
Ann Morgan Guilbert
Fran’s grandmother, Yetta Rosenberg-Jones, was also a recurring mainstay on “The Nanny.” The retirement home-bound woman was frequently confused, incorrectly thinking that Fran and Maxwell were already married and that the Sheffield children were Fran’s.
As it turned out, she was probably just seeing the love and familial bonds that were there early on in the series and knew the way things were headed before anyone else consciously did. The one thing Yetta did get wrong, however, was her assumption that Maxwell and C.C. were having an affair — something that always led to a lot of hilariously uncomfortable moments.
Long before playing Yetta, actor Ann Morgan Guilbert had already cemented her place in the sitcom pantheon via her recurring role as Millie Helper on “The Dick Van Dyke Show.” In addition to that, she appeared in a staggering number of all-time classic TV shows, including “My Three Sons,” “The Andy Griffith Show,” “I Dream of Jeannie,” “Love, American Style,” “Maude,” “Barney Miller,” “Cheers,” “Newhart,” and more. Both during and after her time on “The Nanny,” Guilbert wasn’t done racking up impressive additions to her filmography, adding “Seinfeld,” “Home Improvement,” “Curb Your Enthusiasm,” “Modern Family,” and “Grey’s Anatomy” to her CV. She didn’t do many movies, but she did star in 1995’s “Grumpier Old Men.”
Guilbert’s final role would be as GiGi in the CBS comedy “Life in Pieces,” which she played until July 2016, when she sadly became one of “The Nanny” actors who have passed away.
Charles Shaughnessy
Maxwell “Max” Sheffield, the male lead on “The Nanny,” was the patriarch of the Sheffield family and a successful Broadway producer. But, as was constantly pointed out in one of the show’s ongoing running gags, he wasn’t as successful as Andrew Lloyd Webber — a fact that never stopped getting under his skin. Max had become a widower prior to the series’ debut and was raising his three children as a single father with the help of butler Niles and a succession of nannies. But, like she did for the kids, Fran would change Max’s life — up to and including becoming his wife and giving him his fourth and fifth children by way of the twins that were born at the end of the series.
Of everyone in the cast of “The Nanny,” Charles Shaughnessy is the one who can make the strongest case that the show isn’t his most iconic role. It can easily be argued that distinction belongs to “Days of Our Lives,” where Shaughnessy starred in nearly 1,200 episodes as Shane/Drew Donovan.
He would later return to the world of daytime soap operas with a 2021-2023 stint on “General Hospital.” In between that and “The Nanny,” Shaughnessy appeared in numerous films and television shows, with his recurring stint on Syfy’s “The Magicians” as Christopher Plover being among his more noteworthy roles of the last 10 years.
In 2005, Shaughnessy reunited with Fran Drescher for the sitcom “Living with Fran,” which ran for two seasons on the WB. In a wink towards “Nanny” fans, Shaughnessy played the ex-husband to Drescher’s character.
