Actress Polly Holliday, who is best known for her role in the sitcom Alice, died Tuesday at 88.
Her theatrical agent and friend, Dennis Aspland, confirmed her death to The New York Times.
The actress, who played the sassy waitress “Flo” on the long-running sitcom set in a Phoenix diner, died in her Manhattan home.
Holliday’s death comes less than a year after the passing of co-star Linda Lavin, who played the show’s titular character.
Alice, which ran on CBS from 1976 to 1985, was a loose spinoff of Martin Scorsese’s 1974 Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore. Holliday’s performance as Florence Jean “Flo” Castleberry was beloved by audiences with her signature line, “Kiss my grits,” becoming an iconic quote.
In 1979 and 1980, she won Golden Globe Awards and received multiple Emmy nominations for her portrayal as the Southern waitress. She went on to star in a short-lived spinoff called Flo, which ran from 1980 to 1981.
She also had memorable guest starring roles in other TV shows like The Golden Girls, where she played Rose Nyland’s blind sister, Lily, and as Tim Allen’s witty mother-in-law on Home Improvement.
She also had roles on the big screen in movies like Gremlins, where she played antagonist Ruby Deagle, as well as in All the President’s Men, Mrs. Doubtfire, and The Parent Trap.
Holliday had no immediate survivors.
In addition to TV and movies, she was a Broadway star, most notably in a revival of Tennessee Williams’ “Cat on a Hot Tin Roof,” for which she earned a Tony nomination in 1990. And making her debut in 1974 alongside Dustin Hoffman’s production of “All Over Town.”
Holliday’s belief in the value of theater was apparent, exemplified by an interview she gave two years after her Tony nomination.
“An actor is unfortunate if he doesn’t get to spend a lot of time onstage,” she said in an interview with The Tampa Bay Times. “When you’re onstage, you get to practice every night.”
Holliday was born on July 2, 1937, in Jasper, Alabama, and raised in the small town of Childersburg.
