A comic performer and writer with an unabashed New York accent and sensibility who has portrayed a wide range of common-folk Jewish women, Renee Taylor began her career in New York in the 1950s as a revue comedienne and writer. She first gained national attention as a semi-regular on "The Jack Paar Show". Her early roles were almost always near-stereotypical Jewish characters. Taylor made her film debut for Jerry Lewis in "The Errand Boy" (1961), and in 1968 was Jack Klugman's wife in "The Detective" who tried to distract him from his concentration with the offer of food. In 1977, Taylor appeared on the syndicated "Fernwood Tonight", the offspring of "Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman", as a character who proclaimed herself to be the missing Mary Hartman.
Since the roles she was offered often did not showcase her abilities, Taylor and husband Joseph Bologna began writing and starring in their own plays and independent feature films which they tirelessly promoted. They co-wrote and performed onstage in "Lovers and Other Strangers" (1968), which they later adapted (but did not star in) for the screen in 1970. In 1971, the duo made the feature "Made for Each Other", in which Taylor was Pandora, a talentless performer pursuing the reluctant Bologna as her last chance at happiness. Taylor's self-written characters have often been women with low self-esteem who are desperately seek love yet who also believe themselves to be unattractive. The pair have revived "Made for Each Other" with frequent screenings at their own expense. Taylor and Bologna also co-wrote "Acts of Love and Other Comedies", a 1972 special starring Marlo Thomas that earned them a writing Emmy. Taylor wrote and starred in the 1976 TV-movie "Woman of the Year". In 1995, Taylor co-wrote and co-directed "Love Is All There Is" which centers on two feuding families whose children fall in love. The film was shown out of competition at the 1996 Cannes Film Festival.
Taylor found herself on a hit series when she was cast in the recurring role of Fran Drescher's Flushing, Queens, mother in the CBS sitcom "The Nanny" (1994-99). Again, she played a blowzy, overbearing parent not dissimilar characters she created for herself. Riding on her increased popularity, Taylor co-wrote a stage play with Bologna called "Bermuda Avenue Triangle" (1995), that explored love and relationships in middle age. With Beatrice Arthur as the third star of the piece, the play played to enthusiastic crowds in Los Angeles.