Teri Garr, Oscar-nominated “Tootsie” and “Young Frankenstein” actress, dies at 79
Her numerous film and TV credits also included "Close Encounters of the Third Kind," "The Conversation," and "Friends."
Teri Garr, the Oscar-nominated actress known for her offbeat comedic roles in films such as Tootsie and Young Frankenstein, died Tuesday of multiple sclerosis. She was 79.
Her publicist, Heidi Schaeffer, told Entertainment Weekly that Garr was surrounded by family and friends in Los Angeles in her final moments.
Born in Ohio in 1944 to actor and vaudeville comedian Eddie Garr and Rockette-turned-costume-designer Phyllis Lind, Garr began her showbiz career as a dancer, appearing in a number of Elvis Presley movies. She had bit parts on TV on The Andy Griffith Show, Batman, and Star Trek before her big film break in Francis Ford Coppola's 1974 thriller The Conversation.
That would lead to a scene-stealing role in Mel Brooks' comedy-horror classic Young Frankenstein as Inga, the German-accented assistant of Gene Wilder's Dr. Frederick Frankenstein. Establishing Garr as a comedic force, the film led to roles in 1977's Oh, God!, 1982's Tootsie — which earned her an Oscar nomination for supporting actress — and 1983's Mr. Mom.
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Though she was largely known for her comedic work, Garr also proved her dramatic prowess with turns in Close Encounters of the Third Kind, The Black Stallion, and The Escape Artist. She was a fixture on Late Night With David Letterman and The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson, and hosted Saturday Night Live three times.
Garr's other TV credits included The Odd Couple, M*A*S*H, The Sonny and Cher Show, The Bob Newhart Show, Maude, Barnaby Jones, & Order: Special Victims Unit, and Friends, on which she played the mom of Lisa Kudrow's Phoebe Buffay.
Garr publicly disclosed that she had been living with multiple sclerosis in 2002, a diagnosis she received in the late 1990s. She published an autobiography, Speedbumps: Flooring It Through Hollywood, in 2005, and became an ambassador for the National Multiple Sclerosis Society and chair for the Society's Women Against MS program.
Fellow actress Jamie Lee Curtis and director Paul Feig were among those in Hollywood paying homage to Garr on social media in the wake of her death. Curtis shared a photo of Garr in Young Frankenstein and wrote, "Rest in laughter," while Feig called her a "legend" and "truly one of my comedy heroes."
Garr is survived by her daughter, Molly O'Neil, and grandson, Tyryn.