Bonnie Franklin, the redheaded TV actress who played single mom Ann Romano on the hit sitcom "One Day at a Time," died Friday in Los Angeles at the age of 69.
The cause was complications from pancreatic cancer.
The Santa Monica-born actress' performance as a single mom in her 30s raising two headstrong teenage daughters on "One Day at a Time," which ran from 1975 to 1984, earned her one Emmy nomination and two nominations for Golden Globes.
By the time she appeared on the CBS show, Franklin was a theater veteran. She made her best impression on Broadway in 1970 in the musical "Applause," which earned her a Tony Award nomination for best actress in a musical.
"One Day at Time" was developed by Norman Lear and created by husband and wife writing team Allan Manings and Whitney Blake. It was based on Blake's own life as a single mother, and the Associated Press called it groundbreaking because of its "focus on a young divorced mother seeking independence from a suffocating marriage."
"Even though Ann Romano was not the first divorced woman on TV, she embodied that subject matter in a way that had not been done before," Syracuse University television scholar Robert Thompson told the Washington Post.
Her two daughters in the series were played by Mackenzie Phillips and Valerie Bertinelli.
"My heart is breaking," Bertinelli said in a statement. "Bonnie has always been one of the most important women in my life and was a second mother to me." Bertinelli said Franklin"taught me how to navigate this business and life itself with grace and humor, and to always be true to yourself. I will miss her terribly."
Born Jan. 6, 1944 in Santa Monica, Franklin snagged her first TV role as a child. She reportedly moved to Beverly Hills at the age of 13 and graduated from Beverly Hills High School before attending UCLA.
Her last TV appearance reportedly was a cameo role on the TV soap "The Young and the Restless" in 2012.
— City News Service contributed to this report.
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