Catherine O’Hara, Canadian actress and comedian, dies at 71

According to The New York Times, Catherine O’Hara, the Canadian comedian and actress, died on Friday at 71. Her career began in the 1970s on the Canadian sketch series SCTV. She worked as a waitress at the Second City theater, understudied Gilda Radner and became a full-time SCTV cast member, later winning an Emmy in 1982 for writing for a variety series.

She appeared in films including After Hours, Beetlejuice and Home Alone and maintained a long collaboration with director Christopher Guest, starring in four of his mockumentary films, including Best in Show. O’Hara became widely known to younger audiences for her role as Moira Rose on Schitt’s Creek, winning the Emmy for lead actress in a comedy series in 2020.

She appeared most recently on the series The Studio, attended the 2025 Emmy Awards with that cast and received a lifetime achievement award at the Toronto International Film Festival that year, the article says. Her work also included voice roles—such as Sally and Shock in The Nightmare Before Christmas and three parts in Frankenweenie—and songwriting and musicianship for A Mighty Wind, where she helped write some of the featured songs and learned to play the autoharp.

The piece notes she was raised in an Irish Catholic household and was the sixth of seven children. O’Hara met production designer Bo Welch on the set of Beetlejuice in 1988 and they married in 1992.

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