Frances Sternhagen, Tony Winner Who Battled Charlotte on 'Sex & the City,' Dies at 93

Frances Sternhagen, a Broadway veteran who specialized in playing delightfully fussy women of a certain age on TV, died Monday at her New Rochelle, New York, home, The New York Times Confirmed.

She was 93.

Sternhagen gained her widest exposure as Charlotte's patrician mother-in-law on "Sex and the City" (2000-2002), appearing 10 times on the iconic series. She was nominated for an Emmy for her work.

She had previously perfected the controlling-mom character — albeit one with fewer Chanels hanging in her closet — as Cliff's mother on "Cheers" (1986-1993), for which she received two Emmy nominations.

But Sternhagen was most active on the stage, winning Tonys for her work in both Neil Simon's "The Good Doctor" (1973) and the 1995 revival of "The Heiress."

She starred in "On Golden Pond" on Broadway in 1979, playing — at just 49 — the role Katharine Hepburn would win her final Oscar for several years later. Sternhagen had to settle for a Tony nomination.

Sternhagen was similarly playing older in "Driving Miss Daisy" onstage in 1988 in her fifties. In 1990, Jessica Tandy won an Oscar for her performance in the role, becoming the oldest Best Actress winner at 81.

Her other Tony nominations were for "The Sign in Sidney Brustein's Window" (1964), "Equus" (1973), "Angel" (1978), and "Morning's at Seven" (2002).

Sternhagen was born January 13, 1930, in Washington, D.C. She gave her first performance in 1948, and made her Broadway debut in "The Skin of Our Teeth" (1955).

Her first film was "Up the Down Staircase" (1967), and other film work includes "Starting Over" (1979), "Outland" (1981), "Bright Lights, Big City" (1988), "Misery" (1990), "Doc Hollywood" (1991), "Raising Cain" (1992), "The Mist" (2007), and "Julie and Julia" (2009).

She was preceded in death by her husband Thomas Carlin in 1991. She is survived by their six children, nine grandchildren, and two great-grandchildren.