Growing Pains actress Betty McGuire dies at 100

Betty McGuire, the actress best known as grandmother Kate Malone on Growing Pains, has died at 100. 

She died on 8 October of natural causes at the Motion Picture & Television Country House and Hospital in Woodland Hills, California, according to actor Keith Gerchak, a close friend who confirmed her death to the trade press. 

She had turned 100 in March.

McGuire played Kate, mother of Joanna Kerns’s Maggie Seaver, in 12 episodes from 1986 to 1991. She also appeared in the 1978 films Cheech & Chong’s Up in Smoke, as Sister Mary Quacker, and Coma. 

Her other television credits included Falcon Crest, The Doris Day Show, Columbo, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Hill Street Blues, ER, CSI: Miami, MacGyver, Moonlighting and Charlie’s Angels.

Born on 20 March 1926 in Bridgeport, Connecticut, McGuire performed and understudied on Broadway alongside Ethel Merman, Barbara Cook, Bea Arthur and Tony Randall, in productions including Plain and Fancy, Happy Hunting and Oh, Captain!. 

She headlined as Mame at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas and toured in productions including Gypsy and Auntie Mame.

She lived at the Motion Picture & Television Fund campus from 2017, where she hosted a talk show on the on-site channel, GabFest. 

She also spent years volunteering as a receptionist and advocate at the Coalition for Economic Survival, a legal clinic supporting low-income tenants facing eviction. 

She has no survivors.