Her influence has lived on throughout decades of television.
Mary Tyler Moore, the entertainment industry legend best known for starring in landmark sitcom The Mary Tyler Show, has died at the age of 80, according to the actress’s publicist.
Moore was a prolific performer, a six-time Emmy winner and sitcom staple who was also nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actress for her turn as a grieving mother in 1980’s Ordinary People.
Moore first pinged on America’s radar in a big way on The Dick Van Dyke Show, where she played Van Dyke’s wife, Laura Petrie, from 1960 through 1966. But it was starring as the iconic Mary Richards on The Mary Tyler Moore Show from 1970-1977 that made Moore an institution of her own.
The Mary Tyler Moore Show’s title character was a single woman who became a producer on a Minnesotan news show and moved into an apartment building full of fascinating — and even wonderfully strange — women. The sitcom became a beloved series, running for 168 episodes. It even inspired a spinoff series, Rhoda, that centered on Mary’s eccentric roommate (played by Valerie Harper).
Moore being a single woman was a key element of the show. But when Moore, her producer husband Grant Tinker, and Mary Tyler Moore creators James L. Brooks and Allan Burns first brought the idea to CBS, the network was so unsure about the concept that it famously refused to let them write Mary as a divorced woman.
That did not stop The Mary Tyler Moore Show from depicting Mary’s frustration with dating after ending a longterm relationship, while also balancing a blossoming career as a journalist in an industry that rarely took women seriously. She was, in other words, a rare character to see on television — and she soon found an audience that appreciated the show’s refreshing frankness.
When asked in 2002 why The Mary Tyler Moore Show worked, Moore emphasized that connection with her audience, saying that at the end of the day, Mary was the audience. “I was the voice of sanity around whom all these crazies did their dance, and I reacted in the same way that a member of the audience would have reacted,” she said of the show, later adding, “It was written honestly. There was never any manufactured laugh. There was never compromising of character.”
That might sound easy, but Moore and the show’s refusal to dilute the character of Mary Richards — a single woman whose career was just as important as her home life — was a revolutionary act for television of the era. And that character’s spirit has continued to live on for decades, influencing so many shows that came after Mary Tyler Moore, from Murphy Brown to 30 Rock.
Quite simply: television wouldn’t be the same without her.
You can watch all of The Mary Tyler Moore Show now on Hulu.