Suzanne Pleshette (Bob Newhart Show) Dead at 70
Suzanne Pleshette by Jim Spellman/WireImage.com
Truly a sad weekend for classic television.
Suzanne Pleshette, who was best known for her role as Bob Newhart's wife on television's long-running
The Bob Newhart Show, died on Saturday of respiratory failure. She was 70.
Pleshette began her career as a stage actress and met her future husband,
Tom Poston, when they appeared on Broadway in the 1959 comedy
The Golden Fleecing - though they wouldn't marry until 40 years (and some previous marriages) later. Poston himself
passed away in April 2007, not long after his wife Pleshette underwent chemotherapy for lung cancer.
Pleshette's film career included Jerry Lewis'
The Geisha Boy,
The Birds and
The Ugly Daschund, while her TV appearances included
Have Gun, Will Travel,
Alfred Hitchcock Presents and, most recently,
8 Simple Rules and
Will & Grace.
Pleshette famously reprised her role of Newhart's on-screen wife for the finale of
Newhart, in which the entire country inn-set series was revealed to have been a crazy dream.
