Teri Garr has died at the age of 79.

Garr has played numerous roles in film and television, with over 140 credits. She was best known for her comedic work in films such as 1974 Young Frankenstein and 1982 Tootsiefor which she was nominated for an Oscar. In 2002, Garr announced that she had been diagnosed with multiple sclerosis.

Garr died of the disease on Tuesday “surrounded by family and friends,” publicist Heidi Schaeffer told PEOPLE.

Garr was born in Ohio in 1944. Both parents worked in show business: her father was a vaudeville performer, while her mother was a Rockette who eventually worked in costume production. The family, which included her two older brothers, moved to New Jersey before settling in Los Angeles. Garr’s father died when she was 11 years old.

“She sent two kids to school,” Garr said Los Angeles Times her mother in 2008. “I have a brother who is a surgeon and my other brother builds boats. She was in the closet. She was a customer at the studio. She always said: “We are still alive.” . . .’”

Garr began training as a dancer with a focus on ballet. She dropped out of college and moved to New York to concentrate on acting. There she studied at the Actors Studio and the Lee Strasberg Theater and Film Institute.

She was able to use her dancing skills in her first projects. She appeared in six films with Elvis Presley, including 1964’s Viva Las Vegas. She also appeared as a dancer in television variety shows.

“I was tired of dancing in the choir,” she told Roger Ebert in 1980. “I trained for ten years. Finally I asked myself: ‘Why am I not at the front? I didn’t study all these years to be at the back and not get money.'”

She continued: “But I was shy and sweet. So I went to the psychiatrist and learned how to talk to people. The directors told me, “We want you to play a character that’s a little less complex than you.” Yeah, sure. What they mean is, ‘You’re playing a fool.'”

Her first speaking role was in the 1968 film The Monkees Head. It was written by Jack Nicholson, who she met in acting class. That same year, she appeared in an episode of Star Trek“Assignment: Earth,” which was her first major speaking role. She also became a regular The Sonny & Cher Comedy Hour in 1972.

Soon Garr began to have great success. In 1974 she appeared in Francis Ford Coppola’s Thriller The conversation. In the same year she starred in Mel Brooks’ horror comedy Young Frankenstein as Inga, Dr. Frankenstein’s assistant – a role she secured with the help of her mother.

“My mother was the wardrobe lady Young Frankenstein” she told PBS in 2012. “I asked her if they were done casting and she said she didn’t know.” Garr asked her agent to get her an audition, and after four rounds of auditions she was cast. “It was incredible.” Your time is over Sonny & Cher helped her find the role. “I took the German accent from Cher’s wig lady,” she revealed.

Three years later she played the lead role in Steven Spielberg’s Close encounters of the third kindwhich allowed her to develop her dramatic abilities. In 1982 she starred alongside Dustin Hoffman in “ Tootsie. Film critic Pauline Kael called Garr “the funniest neurotic ditzy on the screen.” She received an Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actress for the film, but lost Tootsie Co-star Jessica Lange.

Garr’s other major film roles included “1981.” One from the heart1983s Mr. Mom1985s After hours and 1992s Mom and Dad save the world. But in a male-dominated comedy world, Garr had to push for more depth in her roles; She wasn’t always successful.

“I tried to make the character a little more realistic,” she said The Washington Post in 1983 about her role in Mr. Mom. “And they stopped me right then and there. You don’t have to be very smart in this business to realize that the only way you’re ever going to do what you really want to do is to become a director.”

She appeared on television in shows such as McCloud, MASH, The Bob Newhart Show, The odd couple, Maud And Barnaby Jones. She was the hostess Saturday Night Live three times, in 1980, 1983 and 1985. Garr was a frequent guest on both The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson And Late Night with David Lettermanalthough she told Roger Ebert in 1988 that she Letterman Performances – where she often filled in for canceled guests – probably kept her from getting more serious roles.

“I first went on the Letterman show to do some stuffing, and then I came back as a fool, a court jester,” she said. Ebert noted that Garr was one of the few Letterman guests who “could put a damper on his confidence.” .”

Later roles for Garr included roles in Casper meets WendyThe women design Spinoff series women of the house, Thick And Spirit world. She also performed Friends as Phoebe’s biological mother.

Garr revealed in 2002 that she had been diagnosed with multiple sclerosis in the 1990s. She first noticed symptoms while filming One from the heart And Tootsie.

She published a memoir, Speedbumps: On the ground through Hollywoodin 2006, where she spoke openly about her illness. “MS is an insidious disease,” she wrote in an excerpt published by PEOPLE. “Like some of my friends, it tends to appear at the most uncomfortable moments and then disappear completely. It would take over 20 years for doctors to figure out what was wrong. Sometimes they mentioned MS, but all tests gave a clear result. Then the symptoms went away and I sort of forgot about it.”

Rumors about her diagnosis before she went public damaged her career. “Whatever this MS was, the industry wanted no part of it,” she wrote. “At first I was outraged. Whatever was going on in my body had been happening for years. It has never gotten in the way of my work. Then I started to think that the job offers had disappeared because I sucked as an actress. It was a tough triad: mysterious symptoms, my insecurities about my acting abilities, and the reality of being an “aging” actress.”

Garr became a national ambassador for the National Multiple Sclerosis Society and national chair of the society’s Women Against MS program. She limited the number of her appearances in projects and retired from acting in 2011.

“It’s not in my nature to slow down, but I have to,” she said Brain & Life Magazine in 2005. “Stress and anxiety and all that tension is not good for MS.”

Garr married John O’Neil in 1993. Together they adopted daughter Molly. The couple separated in 1996.

She is survived by her daughter Molly O’Neil, 30, and her grandson Tyryn, 6.