Photo: Getty Images
Actress Linda Lavin, a Tony Award-winning Broadway legend and sitcom star best known for her role on the TV show Alice, reportedly died at the age of 87 last month after suffering cardiopulmonary arrest with lung cancer, according to her death certificate, which was obtained by TMZ on Monday (January 27).
Cardiopulmonary arrest is a disease that stops blood from pumping into the heart, which prevents oxygen from being delivered to vital organs, according to the Cleveland Clinic's website. Lavin was diagnosed lung cancer prior to her death on December 29, her representative, Bill Veloric, confirmed to the AP via email.
The actress was already an established Broadway star when she transitioned to Hollywood in the mid-1970s, landing the role of Alice Spivak Hyatt on the CBS sitcom Alice based on the 1974 Martin Scorsese film Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore. The character of Hyatt, a widowed mother, became a role model for working moms as the show, which also featured the theme song There's a New Girl in Town performed by Lavin, ran from 1976 to 1985.
Lavin made her return to Broadway in 1987, starring in the play Broadway Bound, which won her her only Tony Award for Best Leading Actress in a Play, having been nominated for the same award three other times for The Tale of the Allergist's Wife (2001), Collected Stories (2010) and The Lyons (2012), as well as Best Supporting or Featured Actress in a Play for Last of the Red Hot Lovers (1970) and Best Featured Actress in a Play for The Diary of Anne Frank.
