Estelle Getty (born Estelle Scher on July 25, 1923 in New York City) is an Emmy and Golden Globe Award winning actress, whose most important beginning role was playing Harvey Fierstein's mother on Broadway in the play Torch Song Trilogy; however, she is best known for her role as Sophia Petrillo on the popular 1980s sitcom, The Golden Girls. In it, she played the wise-cracking old Sicilian mother of Dorothy Zbornak, who was the show's main protagonist, played by Bea Arthur. Getty was actually two months younger than Bea Arthur and was heavily made-up to look significantly older.

She married Arthur Gettleman (from whose name she adopted her stage name) in 1946, and he died in 2004. She has two grown sons: Carl Gettleman who lives in California and Barry Gettleman who lives in Florida.