Jane Curtin is remembering her longtime friend and Kate & Allie co-star Susan Saint James following the actress’ death at age 80.
Saint James died Monday, Oct. 26, after being diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. In a statement to Page Six, Curtin paid tribute to the woman with whom she shared the screen for six seasons on the beloved 1980s CBS sitcom.
“We lost a decent person today,” Curtin, 79, said. “Susan St. James was a decent person who made Kate and Allie a joy. She juggled a really full life from the Ed Sullivan Theater in between working on stage and being the Mom on set.”
Curtin also remembered Saint James’ dedication to causes that were important to her, including the Special Olympics.
“She worked tirelessly for organizations she believed in like the Special Olympics,” Curtin said.
Saint James became involved with the Special Olympics after attending the organization’s first games in Chicago in 1968 at founder Eunice Shriver’s invitation. She went on to serve for decades on the International Special Olympics Board of Directors and later on the board of Special Olympics Connecticut.
Curtin also reflected on the tragedy Saint James endured in her personal life.
“All the while raising children and going through the horrors of losing a child,” she said.
Saint James and her husband, longtime NBC executive Dick Ebersol, lost their youngest son, Teddy, in a private plane crash in Colorado in November 2004. He was 14.
But Curtin’s tribute ultimately returned to the friendship the two women built while making the series that became one of their most memorable projects.
“Susan was my friend, and working with her brought such laughter, community and family to the stage at the Ed Sullivan Theater,” Curtin concluded. “I’ll miss her.”
Curtin and Saint James starred together on Kate & Allie from 1984 to 1989, playing divorced best friends Allie Lowell and Kate McArdle, respectively. The women move in together with their children, creating an unconventional blended household as they navigate friendship, motherhood, dating and life after divorce.
Interestingly, the partnership that Curtin now remembers so fondly nearly didn’t happen.
People profiled Saint James and Curtin shortly after Kate & Allie premiered in 1984, reporting that neither actress was initially sold on the series.
“I could relate to the problems of a divorced woman,” Saint James said at the time, “but I didn’t want to play a show with glib kid actors.”
Curtin had a different concern. She had loved sitcoms that took place outside the home and wasn’t convinced she wanted to play the mother of two older children.
Saint James was ultimately reassured that the show’s young actors wouldn’t be written as stereotypical sitcom kids. Curtin, however, remained reluctant, even as her friends told her she was “crazy to resist.”
That’s when Saint James took matters into her own hands.
“Every step of the way, before every meeting, every reading, every rehearsal, I was on the phone to Jane begging her to show up just one more time,” Saint James recalled.
Her persistence paid off when the actresses finally taped in front of a live audience and the crowd erupted in laughter during the opening scene.
According to Saint James, Curtin came backstage afterward and admitted, “Susan, I’ve never had so much fun in my whole life, and don’t you dare ever tell anybody I said that.”
Their differences ultimately became part of what made their partnership work. People described the more reserved Curtin and outgoing Saint James as having personalities that mirrored the contrasting dynamic between Allie and Kate.
The two actresses had already been friends for several years by then, having met while making the 1980 comedy How to Beat the High Cost of Living. They were also both new mothers when they began discussing what their ideal next jobs might look like.
For Saint James, filming Kate & Allie in New York allowed her to remain close to her family in Connecticut.
“I wanted to be near my husband and to give my children the structure I had as a kid,” she said.
Once the series arrived, audiences quickly embraced the pairing. The premiere ranked fourth among television’s top 10 programs, according to People’s 1984 profile.
The series also offered something relatively unusual on television at the time: two mothers who were allowed to be complicated, independent women rather than conventional sitcom stereotypes.
“This is not a statement saying, ‘Girls, leave the guys and go live with your best friend,'” Saint James said. “Kate and Allie didn’t plan this. It’s just the best solution they could think of, and their friendship sustains them.”
That friendship sustained the series for six seasons. Both women were nominated multiple times for the Emmy Award for Best Actress in a Comedy, with Curtin winning twice.
More than four decades after Saint James had to persuade Curtin to keep showing up “just one more time,” Curtin remembered what came from that persistence: “laughter, community and family.”
Saint James’ representative confirmed her death to People on Tuesday. Her family remembered the Emmy winner as someone who was “generous with her time and energy, which she valued more than money, and instinctively drawn to whoever needed lifting up.”
“She taught her children to pause, be kind and look out for other people,” the family said.
Saint James is survived by Ebersol; her four children, Sunshine Lucas, Harmony Lucas, Charlie Ebersol and Willie Ebersol; seven grandchildren; her sister and her service dog, Lola.
Related: ‘Kate & Allie’ Star Susan Saint James Dies at 80
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