Oscar Nominee Barbara Barrie Dies at 95 After Choosing Medical Aid in Dying

Barbara Barrie, the Oscar nominated actress best known for playing the supportive mother in the 1979 film Breaking Away, has died at the age of 95. She passed away on Wednesday, October 28, at her home in Manhattan. Her daughter Jane Harnick confirmed that the death was medically assisted after Barrie received a terminal cancer diagnosis.

Born Barbara Berman in Chicago in 1931, she grew up in Corpus Christi, Texas, after her family moved there. She started out majoring in journalism at Del Mar College before transferring to the University of Texas, where she earned awards for her work in drama and discovered her true calling on stage. After graduating she headed to New York, mainly because a boyfriend lived there, and decided to give acting a real try even though marriage plans had to wait.

Her Broadway debut came in 1955 in The Wooden Dish. She spent the 1950s and 1960s working steadily in television, appearing in episodes of shows like The Twilight Zone, Route 66, Naked City, and The Fugitive. Her first major film role arrived in 1964 with One Potato, Two Potato, a drama about an interracial relationship that was considered groundbreaking at the time. Barrie won the Best Actress prize at the Cannes Film Festival for that performance.

In 1970 she originated the role of Sarah in the original Broadway production of Stephen Sondheim’s Company and earned a Tony nomination. Years later her work as Evelyn Stoller in Breaking Away brought her an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress. She returned to the same character in a short lived TV series version of the movie and picked up an Emmy nomination for it. On television she is also remembered for playing Elizabeth across 11 episodes of Barney Miller, for work on Suddenly Susan, and for Emmy nominated guest appearances on Law & Order and Law & Order: SVU. She continued returning to Broadway throughout her career, including a 2004 revival of Fiddler on the Roof.

In 1964 she married actor, director, and producer Jay Harnick. They had two children, Jane in 1965 and Aaron in 1969. Jay died in 2007. Barrie is survived by her son and daughter.

In 1994 she was diagnosed with rectal cancer, a disease that ran in her family though it had rarely been discussed openly. She later wrote two books, Second Act and Don’t Die of Embarrassment, to share her experience and push for more awareness so others wouldn’t feel the same silence and stigma. She often said that if she could get the word out about the disease, that would be her real legacy. In later years she also lived with idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis.

Barrie frequently talked about how much her family meant to her and how she preferred ordinary life to the spotlight of awards. She once told an interviewer that she couldn’t stand the whole awards scene because “your life is more important than your work.”