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Actresses (L-R) Betty White, Rue McClanahan and Bea Arthur who starred in TV series "The Golden Girls" - Source: Reuters
Emmy Award-winning actress Bea Arthur, best known as star of the
hit TV comedies Maude and Golden Girls, has died at age 86,
entertainment news websites reported on Saturday.
Arthur, a longtime stage actress whose comic timing and deadpan
delivery were a perfect fit for her sharp-tongued roles on the two
series, died of cancer at her Los Angeles home, celebrity website
TMZ reported.
Representatives for the actress, who won best-actress Emmys --
America's top television award -- for both Maude and Golden Girls,
could not immediately be reached for comment. CNN also reported her
death.
Born Beatrice Frankel in New York on May 13, 1922, Arthur began
performing in college and appeared in a number of Broadway and
off-Broadway roles, winning a Tony Award opposite Angela Lansbury
in Mame.
In the early 1970s, Arthur appeared on the groundbreaking
television comedy All in the Family as Edith Bunker's fiercely
liberal cousin Maude, and producers who saw gold in the role
quickly devised a spinoff for the character.
Maude debuted on CBS in 1972 and became one of the top-rated
sitcoms on US television during its six-season run.
Arthur followed that show with Golden Girls, an unlikely hit from
1985 to 1992 that featured four female retirees living
together.
Central to the popularity of Golden Girls was the comic interplay
between Arthur's character and her mother, played by Estelle Getty
- who in real life was a year younger and who also won an Emmy for
the show.
Getty died last July at the age of 84.
According to CNN, no funeral services had been planned for Arthur,
who is survived by her two sons and two grandchildren.
