Elizabeth Pena dies aged 55

Actress Elizabeth Pena has died at the age of 55.

Elizabeth Pena was known for her roles in Lone Star, Rush Hour and TV shows like sitcoms I Married Dora and Modern Family, in which she played the mother of Sofia Vergara’s character Gloria.

Other film credits included La Bamba, Jacob’s Ladder, Batteries Not Included and Down and Out in Beverly Hills.

Elizabeth Pena’s manager told the Associated Press news agency she died of natural causes after a brief illness. The actress  died in Los Angeles on Tuesday, October 14.

The Cuban-American actress was a familiar face from her dramatic and comedic roles on the big and small screens.

Elizabeth Pena caught the eye in 1986’s Down and Out in Beverly Hills, playing the maid Carmen alongside Bette Midler, Richard Dreyfuss and Nick Nolte.

She won the role, she said, by bribing a security guard at Disney Studios to let her in to see the casting director after an agent had told her she was not attractive enough for the role.

That led to parts in the Ritchie Valens biopic La Bamba and alien comedy Batteries Not Included.

On TV, Elizabeth Pena played a Hispanic housekeeper who married her employer in I Married Dora.