Susan Saint James, 1946 – 2026

TV actress Susan Saint James, 80, died of pancreatic cancer on Oct. 26. Saint James costarred in McMillan & Wife (1971–76) and Kate & Allie (1984-89). Like her lookalike Kate Jackson, Saint James always brought a grown-up intelligence to her roles (though Rock Hudson’s biographer says he thought she was an undisciplined hippie chick during MacMillan and Wife).  Saint James got her start in the late ‘60s, and can be spotted in Ironside, Where Angels Go Trouble Follows!, What’s So Bad About Feeling Good?, and It Takes Thief; she got a supporting role in Fame is the Name of the Game, and then her two star-making roles. Saint James’s career slowed down after that, though she turned up through the 2020s in Night Cries, Love at First Bite, Sex and the Single Parent, How to Beat the High Cost of Living, and a handful of other unremarkable projects. She is survived by her third husband, TV producer Dick Ebersol, and four children (another died in a plane crash), including filmmaker Charlie Ebersol. She told Bobbi Brown, “I went to acting classes for a while, and I thought, ‘Oh, I am going to get stuck in acting classes. When do you graduate from this?’ So I ditched those and I did tryouts at all the studios. An agent who was friends with my friend got me into Universal and they signed me into a contract at 19. They sent me over to read for a part, I met with the director, and he said, ‘Can you read this?’ I read it really fast, I was so nervous. He said, ‘Perfect, just a little bit faster and you've got the part.’”