Please ensure Javascript is enabled for purposes of website accessibility

US Consumer Spending Falls as Trump Tariff’s Muddle Economy

2 days ago

US Supreme Court Lets Parents Take Kids Out of Classes With LGBT Storybooks

3 days ago

In Win for Trump, US Supreme Court Limits Judges’ Power to Block Birthright Citizenship Order

3 days ago

California’s Newsom Sues Fox News for $787 Million for Defamation Over Trump Call

3 days ago

Motorcycle Collides With Tractor in Fatal Fresno County Collision

3 days ago

Fourth of July Celebrations Begin Saturday. Here’s Your Fresno Area Guide

3 days ago

Bill Moyers, Broadcaster and LBJ’s White House Press Secretary, Dies at 91

3 days ago

State Department Approves $30 Million for Gaza Humanitarian Foundation

3 days ago

Cargo Ship That Caught Fire Carrying Electric Vehicles Sinks in the Pacific

4 days ago

4 Million Acres of California Forests Could Lose Protection. What Trump’s ‘Roadless Rule’ Repeal Could Do

4 days ago
Linda Lavin, Star of the Sitcom 'Alice' and Tony Winner, Dies at 87
gvw_ap_news
By Associated Press
Published 6 months ago on
December 30, 2024

Linda Lavin arrives at the 33rd annual Producers Guild Awards on March 19, 2022, at the Fairmont Century Plaza Hotel in Los Angeles. (AP/Chris Pizzello)

Share

Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...

NEW YORK — Linda Lavin, a Tony Award-winning stage actor who became a working class icon as a paper-hat wearing waitress on the TV sitcom “Alice,” has died. She was 87.

Lavin died in Los Angeles on Sunday of complications from recently discovered lung cancer, her representative, Bill Veloric, told The Associated Press in an email.

A success on Broadway, Lavin tried her luck in Hollywood in the mid-1970s. She was chosen to star in a new CBS sitcom based on “Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore,” the Martin Scorsese-directed film that won Ellen Burstyn an Oscar for playing the title waitress.

The title was shortened to “Alice” and Lavin became a role model for working moms as Alice Hyatt, a widowed mother with a 12-year-old son working in a roadside diner outside Phoenix. The show, with Lavin singing the theme song “There’s a New Girl in Town,” ran from 1976 to 1985.

The show turned “Kiss my grits” into a catchphrase and co-starred Polly Holliday as waitress Flo and Vic Tayback as the gruff owner and head chef of Mel’s Diner.

The series bounced around the CBS schedule during its first two seasons but became a hit leading into “All in the Family” on Sunday nights in October 1977. It was among primetime’s top 10 series in four of the next five seasons. Variety magazine listed it among the all-time best workplace comedies.

Broadway Success and Tony Award

Lavin soon went on to win a Tony for best actress in a play for Neil Simon’s “Broadway Bound” in 1987, which also garnered her Drama Desk, Outer Critics and Helen Hayes awards.

“She was a tremendous performer with a generous heart,” the union Actors Equity said on X. The group in 2023 honored her with the Richard Seff Award — given to veteran performers in supporting roles — for her work in Noah Diaz’s “You Will Get Sick.”

She was working as recently as this month promoting a new Netflix series in which she appears, “No Good Deed,” and filming a forthcoming Hulu series, “Mid-Century Modern,” according to Deadline, which first reported her death. She also appeared in 2024 as a guest star in “Elsbeth,” the spinoff of “The Good Wife.”

Early Career and Broadway Breakthrough

Lavin grew up in Portland, Maine, and moved to New York City after graduating from the College of William and Mary. She sang in nightclubs and in ensembles of shows.

Iconic producer and director Hal Prince gave Lavin her first big break while directing the Broadway musical “It’s a Bird … It’s a Plane … It’s Superman.” She went on to earn a Tony nomination in Simon’s “Last of the Red Hot Lovers” in 1969 before winning 18 years later for another Simon play, “Broadway Bound.”

In the mid 1970s, Lavin moved to Los Angeles. She had a recurring role on “Barney Miller” and in 1976 was chosen to star in a new CBS sitcom based on Ellen Burstyn’s Oscar-winning waitress comedy-drama, “Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore.”

Return to Broadway and Later Career

Back on Broadway, Lavin later starred in Paul Rudnick’s comedy “The New Century,” had a concert show called “Songs & Confessions of a One-Time Waitress” and earned a Tony nomination in Donald Margulies’ “Collected Stories.”

“A star in every medium, but pure theatrical genius. Blissfully funny, deeply emotional, and audiences adored her. She never disappointed: I worked with her, and just watching her rehearse and build a performance was an education and the greatest joy,” Rudnick wrote on X.

Michael Kuchwara of the AP gave Lavin a rave in “Collected Stories,” writing that she “gives one of those complete, nuanced performances, capturing the woman’s intellectual vigor, her wry sense of humor and her increasing physical frailty with astonishing fidelity. And Lavin’s sense of timing is superb, whether delivering a joke or acerbically dissecting the work of her protegee.”

Lavin basked in a burst of renewed attention in her 70s, earning a Tony nomination for Nicky Silver’s “The Lyons.” She also starred in “Other Desert Cities” and a revival of “Follies” before they transferred to Broadway.

The AP again raved about Lavin in “The Lyons,” calling her “an absolute wonder to behold as Rita Lyons, a nag of a mother with a collection of firm beliefs and eye rolls, a matriarch who is both suffocating and keeping everyone at arm’s length.”

She also appeared in the film “Wanderlust” with Jennifer Aniston and Paul Rudd, and released her first CD, “Possibilities.” She played Jennifer Lopez’s grandmother in “The Back-Up Plan.”

When asked for guidance from up-and-coming actors, Lavin stressed one thing. “I say that what happened for me was that work brings work. As long as it wasn’t morally reprehensible to me, I did it,” she told the AP in 2011.

She and Steve Bakunas, an artist, musician and her third husband, converted an old automotive garage into the 50-seat Red Barn Studio Theatre in Wilmington, North Carolina.

It opened in 2007 and their productions include “Doubt” by John Patrick Shanley, “Glengarry Glen Ross” by David Mamet, “Rabbit Hole” by David Lindsay-Abaire and “The Tale of the Allergist’s Wife” by Charles Busch, in which Lavin also starred on Broadway, earning a Tony nomination.

She returned to TV in 2013 in “Sean Saves the World,” starring “Will & Grace’s” Sean Hayes, a show which lasted a season. Lavin also made appearances on “Mom” and “9JKL.”

RELATED TOPICS:

DON'T MISS

What Are Fresno Real Estate Experts Predicting for 2025 and Beyond?

DON'T MISS

First California EV Mandates Hit Automakers This Year. Most Are Not Even Close

DON'T MISS

I Detest Netanyahu, but on Some Things He’s Actually Right

DON'T MISS

University of Virginia President Resigns Under Pressure From Trump Administration

DON'T MISS

How Did the Supreme Court Rule? Here’s a Look at the Big Cases

DON'T MISS

Mamdani’s NYC Primary Win Sparks Surge in Anti-Muslim Posts, Advocates Say

DON'T MISS

Trump Sends in DOGE to Slash Federal Gun Regulations by July 4

DON'T MISS

Tensions Flare at Announcement of Major Fresno County Gang Takedown

DON'T MISS

Measure C ‘Blackmailed’ As Fresno Enviro Coalition Gets Huge Say on Transportation Tax

DON'T MISS

Despite $49M Deficit, Fresno Unified Gives Top Brass 5% Raise, 3% One-Time Bonus

DON'T MISS

US Consumer Spending Falls as Trump Tariff’s Muddle Economy

DON'T MISS

US Supreme Court Preserves Key Element of Obamacare

UP NEXT

University of Virginia President Resigns Under Pressure From Trump Administration

UP NEXT

How Did the Supreme Court Rule? Here’s a Look at the Big Cases

UP NEXT

Mamdani’s NYC Primary Win Sparks Surge in Anti-Muslim Posts, Advocates Say

UP NEXT

Trump Sends in DOGE to Slash Federal Gun Regulations by July 4

UP NEXT

Tensions Flare at Announcement of Major Fresno County Gang Takedown

UP NEXT

Measure C ‘Blackmailed’ As Fresno Enviro Coalition Gets Huge Say on Transportation Tax

UP NEXT

US Consumer Spending Falls as Trump Tariff’s Muddle Economy

UP NEXT

US Supreme Court Preserves Key Element of Obamacare

UP NEXT

US Supreme Court Lets Parents Take Kids Out of Classes With LGBT Storybooks

UP NEXT

Fresno Unified Trustees Will Get Automatic Raises on Tuesday

Mamdani’s NYC Primary Win Sparks Surge in Anti-Muslim Posts, Advocates Say

2 days ago

Trump Sends in DOGE to Slash Federal Gun Regulations by July 4

2 days ago

Tensions Flare at Announcement of Major Fresno County Gang Takedown

2 days ago

Measure C ‘Blackmailed’ As Fresno Enviro Coalition Gets Huge Say on Transportation Tax

2 days ago

Despite $49M Deficit, Fresno Unified Gives Top Brass 5% Raise, 3% One-Time Bonus

2 days ago

US Consumer Spending Falls as Trump Tariff’s Muddle Economy

2 days ago

US Supreme Court Preserves Key Element of Obamacare

2 days ago

US Supreme Court Lets Parents Take Kids Out of Classes With LGBT Storybooks

3 days ago

Fresno Unified Trustees Will Get Automatic Raises on Tuesday

3 days ago

Alleged ‘Fake’ ICE Agents Charged. Fresno Court Date Set

3 days ago

I Detest Netanyahu, but on Some Things He’s Actually Right

Like a lot of people of center-right/center-left political leanings, I’ve spent the past few decades detesting Prime Minister Benjamin Netan...

2 days ago

2022 Election Rally for Netanyahu
2 days ago

I Detest Netanyahu, but on Some Things He’s Actually Right

University of Virginia President James Ryan Resigns
2 days ago

University of Virginia President Resigns Under Pressure From Trump Administration

2 days ago

How Did the Supreme Court Rule? Here’s a Look at the Big Cases

Zohran Mamdani Speaks to Supporters
2 days ago

Mamdani’s NYC Primary Win Sparks Surge in Anti-Muslim Posts, Advocates Say

American Flag Revolver
2 days ago

Trump Sends in DOGE to Slash Federal Gun Regulations by July 4

Rob_Bonta_Speaking_At_Press_Conference_1280x720
2 days ago

Tensions Flare at Announcement of Major Fresno County Gang Takedown

Garry_Bredefeld_Sandra_Celedon_Mesure_C_1280x720
2 days ago

Measure C ‘Blackmailed’ As Fresno Enviro Coalition Gets Huge Say on Transportation Tax

Fresno_Unified_Raises_1280x720
2 days ago

Despite $49M Deficit, Fresno Unified Gives Top Brass 5% Raise, 3% One-Time Bonus

Help continue the work that gets you the news that matters most.

Search

Send this to a friend