CAROLINE AARON Cherish EVERY DAY

Mrs. Maisel's funny lady talks about her favorite co-stars and reflects on her personal journey

Her role as the irrepressible Shirley Maisel on The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel was only supposed to last one episode, but fortunately for viewers of the period comedy streaming on Amazon Prime, the producers realized they had someone special in Caroline Aaron. In the recent fourth season, the veteran actress, 69, showed her depth as Shirley tried to set up her divorced son (with hilarious results) and also confronted the possibility of life without her husband, Moishe. "Home and heart define her in every way," Caroline tells Closer. "I also like that she always tells the truth as far as she's concerned. She has plenty of terrible things to say about people, but she doesn't feel like it's judgment. She feels like that's just truth."

Caroline is currently filming the fifth and final season of the celebrated series about a female stand-up comedian in mid-century New York City.

You grew up in Richmond, Va. How did that shape who you are today?

My mother was widowed very young, so she had to go to work, and the only place she could get a job was at an all-Black university. Through my mother, the Black community became part of my personal community. She was a remarkable woman. She was from that generation of women who were supposed to be more decorative than essential, yet she was doing this incredible work bringing disparate communities together. She would always say, "Your responsibility as a Jew is to leave the world a better place than you found it."

Were you in touch with your Jewish heritage as a child?

During that time, there was no cultural Judaism in the South. I never went to a bar mitzvah or a bat mitzvah. There was no such thing when I was growing up. When I moved to New York, I just could not believe what it was like to live in a place where there was a Jewish community.