‘Alice’ Star & Tony Winner Linda Lavin Dies at 87

Actress Linda Lavin died unexpectedly in Los Angeles on Sunday, December 29, at the age of 87.  The star of CBS sitcom Alice, she had recently been diagnosed with lung cancer, Deadline reported.

Lavin was working as recently as December 4, when she attended an event in Hollywood to promote her new Netflix series No Good Deed. She had also been filming her upcoming Hulu comedy Mid-Century Modern.

Linda Lavin attends the premiere of Netflix’s “No Good Deed” on December 04, 2024 in Hollywood, California. (Photo by Kevin Winter/Getty Images)

Lavin guest-starred on Barney Miller before getting her own TV series Alice, in which she played the lead role of a waitress and widowed mom Alice Hyatt, who had a 12-year-old son and worked at a roadside diner near Phoenix, Arizona.  The show turned “Kiss my grits” into a catchphrase and ran from 1976 to 1985. It also featured Lavin singing the theme song “There’s a New Girl in Town.” The hit comedy was based on the Martin Scorsese-directed movie Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore, which won an Oscar for its lead Ellen Burstyn.

ALICE, Linda Lavin, TV GUIDE cover, October 23-29, 1976. TV Guide/ Everett Collection

Lavin, who was born in Portland, Maine, had huge success on Broadway, earning a Tony nominee for Last of the Red-Hot Lovers in 1969, before winning a Best Actress Tony 18 years later for Broadway Bound.

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