An actress who starred in a hit 1970s sitcom was unrecognisable when recently being snapped in Los Angeles.
Beginning her acting career as a child, Linda Lavin was born in Maine in 1937 and began appearing on Broadway in the 1960s, including in It’s a Bird…It’s a Plane…It’s Superman in 1968.
In 1970 she received her first Tony Award nomination for Last of the Red Hot Lovers, before moving to Hollywood three years later to work on television.
After various guest appearances on series such as The Nurses, Rhoda, Harry O and Kaz, she was cast in a recurring role as Detective Janice Wentworth on Barney in 1975.
She then left the show in its second season after being cast as the titular character in the sitcom Alice, which ran for nine seasons from 1976 until 1985.
Based on Martin Scorsese’ 1974 film Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore, it followed a widow who moves with her young son to start life over again and finds a job working at a roadside diner in Phoenix, Arizona.
The actress also performed the show’s theme song, There’s a New Girl in Town, and also earned two Golden Globe Awards and a Primetime Emmy Award nomination during the show’s run.
Two years after Alice wrapped up, Linda returned to Broadway for the first time in a decade, appearing in shows including Broadway Bound, The Sisters Rosenweig and The Diary of Anne Frank.
She also appeared many telefilms between 1967 and 1998, as well as The Muppets Take Manhattan in 1984.
After mainly working in theatre over two decades, Linda was cast in the sitcom Sean Saves the World in 2013, starring alongside Will & Grace’s Sean Hayes.
She has also appeared in Touched by an Angel, The Soprano’s, The O.C., The Good Wife, Bones, Santa Clarita Diet and most recently, an episode of Elsbeth earlier this year.
Although the actress continues to appear on our screens, a recent public appearance saw her striking a glamorous figure in her everyday life too.
A month out from her 87th birthday, Linda was seen in LA wearing a printed blouse with billowing blue pants on an outing.
Linda regularly shares updates of her career and personal life on her Instagram account, which boasts 20,000 followers.
Last week she shared a clip from Alice, writing: ‘Alice premiered 48 years ago today – August 31, 1976! It changed my life.’
A few months ago, it was also announced she had been cast in the upcoming Ryan Murphy series Mid-Century Modern, a gay spin on The Golden Girls.
It will star Matt Bomer and Nathan Lane, with Linda playing the latter’s mother. It is due to be released next year.
The actress has also been married three times, firstly to Ron Leibman, whom she divorced in 1981.
Her second marriage, to Kip Niven, whom she met on the set of Alice, ended in a divorce in 1992.
While she has no biological children, Linda is the stepmother of the children of her second husband.
She married her third husband Steven Bakunas in 2005, with the couple previously living in Wilmington, North Carolina before relocating to New York City around 2013.
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Actor Stephen is 20 years her junior and has featured on such series as One Tree Hill.