Betty A. Bridges , who guested on dozen of popular TV series during a 40-year career ranging from Good Times and Charlie’s Angels to Lou Grant and Hill Street Blues to ER and 2 Broke Girls and later was a prominent acting coach, died August 27. She was 83.
She died at the Phoenix home of her son, Diff’rent Strokes and reality TV star Todd Bridges, where she had been in hospice care. Rep Elizabeth Much confirmed her death to Deadline, but no cause was given. Born on August 1, 1941, Betty Bridges got her screen start guesting on such 1970s TV shows as Police Woman, Charlie’s Angels and Norman Lear’s Good Times and Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman.
She continued to work consistently for much of the next four decades, mostly in TV. She made guest appearances in popular series including Wonder Woman; What’s Happening!!; Quincy, M.E.
; CHiPs; Lou Grant; Diff’rent Strokes; Hill Street Blues; Dallas; Beverly Hills, 90210; Ally McBeal, The Practice, NYPD Blue, Scrubs and 2 Broke Girls. Along the way, Bridges also appeared on the big screen in A Night at the Roxbury, Rooster, The Concrete Jungle and others. She also appeared in the 2000 short film Building Bridges, written and directed by her sons Todd and Jimmy Bridges, the latter also a veteran actor.
DEADLINE RELATED VIDEO: She became a prominent Hollywood manager and acting coach and co-founded Kane Bridge Academy, an acting school where she was a popular teacher. She worked mainly with children, particularly minorities, and e.