Elizabeth Franz has died.
The Tony Award winning actress – who was best known for her role in the 1999 Broadway revival of Death of a Salesman - has passed away at the age of 84 following a battle with cancer, her husband, screenwriter Christopher Pelham, told The New York Times.
She passed away at her home in Woodbury, Connecticut on November 4, with her husband explaining she had a “severe reaction” to the drugs that were used to treat her illness.
Elizabeth won the Tony Award for Best Featured Actress in a Play for her portrayal of Linda Loman in the 50th-anniversary Broadway production of Arthur Miller’s play.
She also reprised the role in a 2000 TV adaptation of Death of a Salesman, for which she earned an Emmy nomination.
Miller was a fan of her portrayal, telling The New York Times in 1999 that Franz: “has discovered in the role the basic underlying powerful protectiveness, which comes out as fury, and that in the past, in very performance I know of, was simply washed out”.
Franz was born in Akron, Ohio on June 18, 1941.
She was inspired to become an actress after watching Loretta Young in the 1947 movie The Bishop’s Wife.
She earned Tony nominations in 1983 and 2002 for her roles in Neil Simon’s Brighton Beach Memoirs and the Morning’s at Seven revival.
She also won an Obie Award in 1980 for her performance as the strict nun in Christopher Durang’s Sister Mary Ignatius Explains It All for You.
Franz appeared on soap operas As The World Turns and Another World, along with TV shows Roseanne, Gilmore Girls, Law Order, Cold Case, Dear John, and Judging Amy.
She is survived by her husband and her brother, Joe.
