Actress Catherine O’Hara, also a writer and screenwriter, died this Friday in Los Angeles at the age of 71. She was known for her roles as Kevin’s mother in alone at home (My poor little angelin Latin America), Delia Deetz in Bitelchús o Beetlejuice (and also in its recent sequel), Moira Rose in the award-winning comedy Schitt’s Creekwhich earned him many awards, and most recently for being Patty, the satirical producer on the series The Studiofor which she had just been nominated for a Golden Globe.
The middle TMZ has given the news of her death exclusively, and her agents have confirmed it, explaining that the interpreter has died after a brief illness. Local media report that emergency services received a call from her home in the Brentwood neighborhood of Los Angeles, one of the most exclusive in the city, shortly before five in the morning, and that she was transferred to a hospital shortly after. The actress had various projects underway. In fact, next Tuesday he was scheduled to participate in an event about the second season of The Studio in Santa Monica, in Los Angeles.
Canadian, O’Hara started his career in the mid-seventies on television. He participated in more than a hundred productions, becoming a popular face in Hollywood. Since 1992 she was married to production designer Bo Welch, whom she met on the set of Bitelchúsand they had two sons, Matthew and Luke. and also one extra: Macaulay Culkin, whose fierce mother he played in 1990 in alone at home and also in Home Alone 2: Lost in New York (1992). Her relationship with the child actor continued over the years and, as she herself said, he continued to affectionately call her “mom.”
Culkin has been one of the first to mourn her loss, in an emotional message on Instagram with a photograph of both of them: one from the 1990s and another recent, when she accompanied him to receive his star on the Walk of Fame in December 2023: “Mom. I thought we would have time. I wanted more. I wanted to sit next to you. I wanted to listen to you. But I had much more to say. I love you. See you later.”
By birth, O’Hara was not destined to be an actress. Born in Toronto in March 1954, far from the glitter of Hollywood, her parents were a real estate agent and a Canadian railway worker, and her first role was that of the Virgin Mary in a school Christmas play. After studying and graduating, she began working as a waitress in a theater, which, as she herself said in an interview with People Just a few months ago, it helped him discover talent, to be able to see dozens of actors on stage.
Waiting tables he got the bug and decided to introduce himself to some castings of that theater, although it was not easy for her: those who would later be her companions did not encourage her, rather, they let her know that it was better for her to continue with a tray in hand. But she kept insisting on auditions and more auditions until she landed a role. On that stage he shared space and scripts—and many moments of improvisation—with those who would later become lifelong colleagues, such as Martin Short or Eugene Levy.
Those improvisations on stage made the leap to television to become Second City TV, a comedy that, thanks to fifty episodes, made her a well-known face; In addition, it earned him his first Emmy, as a screenwriter. At that time, I barely earned any of it. They offered him to perform in Saturday Night Liveand, although he said yes, he finally returned to Second City and never participated in the great show American nightlife. According to what she said in interviews, she feared that this would close the doors on her and that she would be branded lazy. The fact that Second City ending in 1984 allowed him to take a small turn in his career and move on to film.
O’Hara began to become secondary in comedy productions, and from the eighties onwards she participated in such popular films as Wow, what a night! (1985), by Martin Scorsese, The cake is over (1986), Dick Tracy (1990) y Wyatt Earp (1994). Tim Burton collaborator, they worked together on Beetlejuice in 1988 and in its sequel Beetlejuice, Beetlejuice(o Bitelchús, Bitelchús) in 2024, and voiced Sally in Nightmare before Christmas. But global fame came to her for playing Kate McAllister, Kevin McAllister’s fierce mother, in alone at home.
However, the praise of critics would take a while to arrive, and curiously they did so again with the help of his good friend Eugene Levy, with whom he took his first steps. In 2015, the two played a married couple in the comedy Schitt’s Creek. In fact, it was Levy himself, along with his son Daniel, who created this satire about a rich family that loses everything and is forced to live in a sad motel in a lost town. What a small Canadian pay channel began to broadcast grew by word of mouth, reached Netflix and became a phenomenon until it won the Emmy for best comedy series in 2020 thanks to its sixth and final season.
As she herself said, after 30 years, people stopped saying “Kevin!” (in reference to Culkin’s role in alone at home) and to recognize her as Moira, the protagonist of the series. She always thanked the Levys—even when she received the Emmy—for creating such a fun and authentic role for a woman her age. Thanks to him he also received the Golden Globe, the Screen Actors Guild Award and the Critics’ Choice, among others.
In recent years, he had not stopped working. He appeared in films like For Argy and gave voice to different animation projects, such as Elemental and the Oscar nominee in 2025 Wild Robot. Her role as a therapist in the second season of The Last of Us. But above all she stood out for her role as the resentful producer Patty in The Studiothe Apple TV comedy that won the last Golden Globe. It also earned her a nomination, which would be the last of her life.