Teri Garr, Oscar-nominated star of “Tootsie,” “Young Frankenstein,” dies at 79

Teri Garr, who was nominated for an Oscar for her supporting role in “Tootsie” and also “Young Frankenstein,” “Mr. Mom” and “Close Encounters of the Third Kind” has died at the age of 79.

She had suffered from multiple sclerosis for years: she was diagnosed with the degenerative disease in 1999. Garr is “surrounded by family and friends,” her publicist Heidi Schaeffer told the Associated Press on Tuesday.

The actress said she first noticed symptoms of MS while filming “Tootsie” in New York in 1982. After revealing her diagnosis years later, she said
became a national ambassador for the National Multiple Sclerosis Society and national chair of the society's Women Against MS program (WAMS).

In December 2006, Garr suffered a brain aneurysm that left her in a coma for a week, but after therapy she regained her speech and motor skills.

In the '90s, the often unconventional actress, who critic Pauline Kael once called “the funniest neurotic ditzy on screen,” was perfectly cast in the recurring role of Lisa Kudrow's estranged birth mother Phoebe Abbott on “Friends.”

After playing the crazy lab assistant Inge to Gene Wilder's crazy doctor in Mel Brooks' “Young Frankenstein,” she took on the role of Richard Dreyfuss' long-suffering wife in “Close Encounters of the Third Kind,” another disgruntled wife role alongside by John Denver in “Oh, God!”

The sought-after actress starred in some of her best-known films of the '80s, including “Tootsie,” in which she played Sandy, the abused girlfriend of Dustin Hoffman's main character. She received an Oscar nomination for the role, but lost out to her co-star Jessica Lange (who also competed against Meryl Streep in Sophie's Choice for her role as troubled actress Frances Framer in Frances).

Garr starred in 1983’s “Mr. Mom” and one of the strange SoHo residents Griffin Dunne encounters during his nightmarish odyssey in Martin Scorsese’s “After Hours.”

More to come…