A New York City actress with Lawrence ties was shot in the face early Thursday morning by her former fiance, who then killed himself. The woman’s visiting mother witnessed the shootings.

Lyric Benson, a 22-year-old Yale graduate who had performed voice-overs and small acting roles, was being kept alive at a New York hospital so her organs could be donated, The New York Times reported Friday.

Her grandmother, Lawrence resident Wynona “Wynne” Mihura awaited news later that night as the shock wore off and grief set in.

“I’ve cried a million tears over it,” she said from home, where a framed picture of Benson sat on the kitchen table beside a lit votive candle.

“She was so delightful,” Mihura said. “The most beautiful person inside as she was on the outside.”

The Times reported that Benson and her mother, a first-grade teacher from North Carolina, shared a dessert Wednesday night at a bistro where Benson worked.

After her shift, police said, Benson called her Chinatown apartment and asked her mother to come downstairs and let her in the building.

As her mother opened the door, Benson was shot by Robert J. Ambrosino, a 32-year-old in the United States Merchant Marine who had been unemployed for about a year.

The Times reported that Benson had been dating Ambrosino since before graduating from Yale last May, but she broke off the engagement a few months ago.

The Times reported there was no record of any restraining order or domestic violence complaint against Ambrosino, although friends said he became nervous after the couple’s break-up.

Mihura said Benson’s family would never have imagined such an incident could take place.

Lyric Benson’s father, Terry Benson, a teacher at Turner High School in Kansas City, Kan., even had met and had dinner with Ambrosino, Mihura said.

“Terry never did fault him or put him down, except that he wasn’t ready for her to get married,” Mihura said.

Mihura said that Benson became engaged to Ambrosino, who traveled a lot with the merchant marine, before she really knew him.

“He was not in her league,” Mihura said of the relationship between Ambrosino and Benson, who had performed small roles in soap operas and on “Law and Order: Criminal Intent.” She was also featured throughout the city in an American Express advertisement for an upcoming film festival.

Mihura said the family was doing a lot of speculating but guessed that Ambrosino couldn’t handle having lost Benson.

“If he couldn’t have her, no one else could,” Mihura said.

She said Benson had always loved to act. As a child she would ham it up at her parent’s neighborhood parties.

Benson had spent time with her mother in Morocco, spoke French and Arabic, and made friends easily.

She was an “adjustable child” who loved New York and was willing to work her way up the acting ladder, Mihura said.

“She just was an adorable, lovable child,” she added. “We were so, so proud of her.”