Teri Garr, an Oscar-nominated actress known for her work in films like Young Frankenstein, Tootsie and Mr. Mom, has died, according to her manager.
She was 79.
Garr died on Tuesday in Los Angeles (Wednesday morning in Australia), more than 20 years after she was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis, her manger Marc Gurvitz told CNN.
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Actress Teri Garr has died, according to her manager. (Getty)She first shared her diagnosis publicly in a 2002 interview with CNN in an effort raise awareness for others living with MS.
"I think everybody is scared and frightened when they hear something like that," Garr recalled of first learning her diagnosis.
"That's because there's so much – you know, there's not a lot of information out there about it. And a lot of people don't know that it's not that bad. I mean, I'm going on with my life."
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Garr was 79. Here she is in 1993. (CBS/Everett Collection via CNN Newsource)The daughter of a Broadway performer and a Rockette, Garr studied dance growing up and began auditioning soon after she graduated from high school in Los Angeles.
Her intrepid career in Hollywood spans decades, with her earliest credits including appearances on TV shows like Star Trek and That Girl.
The 1970s proved to be a prolific time for Garr, appearing on several episodes of the sketch comedy series The Sonny and Cher Comedy Hour, The New Dick Van Dyke Show, The Odd Couple and The Bob Newhart Show, among many others.
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Her break into film came in 1974, when she starred as Inga in the Mel Brooks-directed comedy hit Young Frankenstein alongside Gene Wilder, Madeline Kahn and Marty Feldman.
Two years later, Garr appeared in one of her most notable roles when she played Robbie Neary, a wife trying to understand her husband's (Richard Dreyfuss) inexplicable obsession as the result of an alien encounter, in Steven Spielberg's 1977 sci-fi epic Close Encounters of the Third Kind.
In Tootsie, Garr played a put-upon struggling actress who was dating Dustin Hoffman's protagonist who in turn goes on to great fame pretending to be a woman on a soap opera.
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Marty Feldman, Cloris Leachman, Gene Wilder and Teri Garr in Young Frankenstein. (20th Century Fox/Everett Collection via CNN)The role scored Garr a nomination for best supporting actress at the 1983 Academy Awards.
"I was proud," Garr wrote of the nomination in her 2005 memoir, Speedbumps. "The Academy not only knew I existed, they thought I was good!"
That same year, she played Caroline Butler in the family comedy Mr. Mom alongside Michael Keaton.
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In a 2012 interview, Garr said she was not surprised two of her most memorable roles dealt with breaking stereotypes about gender norms.
"I resent it when they write the part of a woman who's just a sexy femme fatale who seduces people to ger [sic] her way, perpetrating the myth that that's how woman have to operate, instead of using their brains or their wit," Garr reflected.
Her career continued with more film and television work. Throughout the '90s, Garr appeared in 1991's Good & Evil, 1994's Good Advice and 1995's Women of the House.
Garr worked on voice acting later on. (Getty)Garr was known for her slightly addled and zany comic timing, which naturally made her the perfect candidate to play mother to Lisa Kudrow's Phoebe Bouffay on Friends. Garr appeared in three episodes total over the third and fourth seasons.
Throughout the 2000s, Garr made guest appearances on Felicity, ER and Live with Bonnie.
She also delved into voice acting work in the early aughts, voicing the character of Mary McGinnis in the animated Batman Beyond TV series, as well as voicing the Sandy Gordon in 2003's What's New, Scooby Doo? animated series.
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