Canadian-born actress Catherine O’Hara has died at the age of 71, her management agency announced Friday. The agency said she died at her Los Angeles home “following a brief illness.”
O’Hara was an Emmy winner best known for her role as Moira Rose on the hit comedy series Schitt’s Creek and for memorable film appearances in Home Alone and Beetlejuice. Her career also included work on the Hollywood satire show The Studio and other film and television projects spanning more than five decades.
US entertainment outlet Page Six reported O’Hara had been rushed to a hospital before dawn from her Brentwood, Los Angeles, home. The official cause of death has not been released.
Condolences poured in on social media, with Canadian leaders and fans praising her long career and influence on comedy. One message noted that over five decades O’Hara “earned her place in the canon of Canadian comedy.”
Early career and SCTV
O’Hara launched her career in Toronto with the Second City comedy troupe in the 1970s and was a member of the original cast of the sketch series SCTV (Second City Television). That show, which later aired in the United States, helped establish her profile and earned her an Emmy for her writing contributions.
Film roles and mainstream fame
She transitioned to film with a string of character roles, including parts in Martin Scorsese’s After Hours (1985) and Tim Burton’s Beetlejuice (1988). O’Hara reached a broad moviegoing audience as the frazzled mother in the two wildly popular Home Alone films, which became holiday staples and major box office hits in the early 1990s.
Schitt’s Creek and a late-career renaissance
O’Hara received renewed acclaim and a new generation of fans for her lead performance as Moira Rose on Schitt’s Creek, created by long-time collaborator Eugene Levy and his son Dan. The show’s success brought widespread recognition and awards for the cast.
Reflecting on the shift in public attention, O’Hara once told People magazine she used to be recognized chiefly by fans asking her to shout her Home Alone line “Kevin!” and that the attention she received after Schitt’s Creek was something she had never experienced before.
Her death marks the loss of a versatile performer whose work in sketch comedy, film and television left a lasting mark on both Canadian and international comedy.