Lydia Cornell, who became a sex symbol in the 1980s on the hit sitcom Too Close for Comfort, was radiant as ever when glimpsed out in Los Angeles recently.
She and Deborah Van Valkenburgh shot to fame on the show as Sara and Jackie Rush, two adult sisters who live downstairs from their parents.
Ted Knight and Nancy Dussault starred as their father and mother Henry and Muriel, respectively a curmudgeonly cartoonist and a photographer in San Francisco.
Cornell has also acted on such beloved series as The Love Boat, Knight Rider, The Dukes of Hazzard, The A-Team, Hunter and Curb Your Enthusiasm.
Now aged 72, she was spotted walking her dog in Los Angeles over the weekend, her luminous complexion framed by her still blonde hair.
Draping her lithe figure in a sweater and a set of black trousers, she warded off the California rays with a baseball cap and shades.
Lydia Cornell, who became a sex symbol in the 1980s on the sitcom Too Close for Comfort, was radiant as ever when glimpsed out in Los Angeles recently; seen in a promo shot for the show
As Sara Rush, Cornell became an instant sex symbol to the point her manager worried openly about ‘trying to make sure she doesn’t get locked into a T&A image’
ABC had already auditioned about 300 actresses for the part of Sara Rush when Cornell came in and won the job because of a stupendous mistake she made
She was born Lydia Korniloff in El Paso, Texas to an artistic family, including a concertmaster father and a concert violinist mother.
On her maternal side, she was the great-great-granddaughter of Harriet Beecher Stowe, the author of the 19th century anti-slavery novel Uncle Tom’s Cabin.
‘I dreamed everyday of coming to Hollywood and being in movies. I guess kids who don’t get enough love at home, need attention on a grand scale,’ she recalled to the website Retro Crush decades later.
While in college in Colorado, she worked as a photographer and ‘kitchen girl’ at the famous Caribou Ranch recording studio, mingling with such musicians as Billy Joel, the Beach Boys, Joni Mitchell, Carole King and David Cassidy.
‘I would watch TV, track down all the names of every producer from every show and write to them. I told them I wanted to come to Hollywood and become an actress,’ she explained to Fox News a few years ago.
‘The minute I got to town, I was invited by an agent to a dinner party. I remember at the front booth of this fancy restaurant was Aaron Spelling. He was sitting with Natalie Wood and Robert Wagner. I was so starstruck.’
Her encounter with Aaron Spelling led to her first speaking role, a part on his iconic series The Love Boat in 1980, kicking off her Hollywood career.
Later that year she landed the role that made her a star – the ditzy Sara on Too Close for Comfort, a role she played for five seasons on ABC from 1980 to 1985.
Now aged 72, she was spotted walking her dog in Los Angeles over the weekend, her luminous complexion framed by her still blonde hair
Draping her lithe figure in a sweater and a set of black trousers, she warded off the California rays with a baseball cap and shades
She was born Lydia Korniloff in El Paso, Texas to an artistic family, including a concertmaster father and a concert violinist mother
On her maternal side, she was the great-great-granddaughter of Harriet Beecher Stowe, the author of the 19th century anti-slavery novel Uncle Tom’s Cabin
ABC had already auditioned about 300 actresses for the part when Cornell came in and won the job because of a stupendous mistake she made.
At the point when the script said: ‘Sara gives Dad a raspberry,’ she handed an actual raspberry to the producer reading the part of her father.
The incredulous producer had to explain to her what blowing a raspberry meant, as the room dissolved into laughter and the show’s co-developer Arne Sultan said: ‘She just fell off the turnip truck. She’s perfect, she’s Sara!’
Based on the British sitcom Keep It in the Family starring Robert Gillespie and Pauline Yates, Too Close for Comfort proved a hit with American audiences.
As Sara Rush, Cornell became an instant sex symbol to the point her manager worried openly about ‘trying to make sure she doesn’t get locked into a T&A image.’
Cornell shared that fans sent her gifts up to and including jewels from Tiffany’s, as well as occasionally ‘letters that are scary, that are so strange, you have to wonder,’ via the Spokane, Washington paper the Spokesman-Review.
After five seasons, the daughters were written out of what was refashioned into The Ted Knight Show, which lasted one season until Knight died of cancer in 1986.
‘Ted and I had a love-hate relationship,’ Cornell confessed later. ‘He didn’t want the girls to become more popular than he was, so when we had funny episodes that revolved around us, Ted would put a stop to that. He even went so far as to bring in a new baby, and add more older people storylines.’
Cornell is pictured in a publicity still from Too Close for Comfort with Nancy Dussault (left) and Ted Knight (center), who starred as her character’s parents
Cornell said Knight ‘didn’t want the girls to become more popular than he was, so when we had funny episodes that revolved around us, Ted would put a stop to that’
She remembered getting wind of a rumor that ‘they would hide my fan mail, to make sure I didn’t think I had any fans. They would only give us five letters each to make it fair. Once I came to work and Ted was holding a magazine with my picture on the cover. He threw it at me and said: “I’m the star of the show, not you!”‘
However they ‘made up’ before his death and she ‘cried so hard at his funeral. We were all together, relying on each other for comfort. But I just couldn’t stop crying. We really loved him and he was like a father figure to us – a real father.’
Cornell shared a much less fraught bond with her TV sister Deborah Van Valkenburgh, who has remained a friend of hers with whom she met up last week.
She cheerfully posted an Instagram photo this past Thursday that showed her sitting with her ‘costar/BFF Deborah Van Valkenburgh, Dottie McQuown (our amazing hairdresser) and me at a reunion lunch for Too Close for Comfort.’
Cornell also enjoyed a warm rapport with Jim J. Bullock, who played her character’s close friend Monroe Ficus and whom she had ‘a major crush on’ at a time when ‘I was the only person who didn’t have a clue he was gay!’
She had better luck romantically with David Hasselhoff, whom she ‘dated briefly’ while performing a guest role on his classic 1980s series Knight Rider.
Cornell guest-starred on a variety of iconic series like Charlie’s Angels, T.J. Hooker, The Drew Carey Show and Fantasy Island, as well as TV specials with the likes of Debbie Reynolds, Don Rickles, Andy Griffith and Bill Cosby.
Her movies included the 1982 horror picture Bloodtide, with a cast headed by James Earl Jones and featuring Zorba the Greek star Lila Kedrova.
She has a son called Jack Mulholland, 31, the identity of whose father she has not publicly shared, and from 2002 to 2010 she was married to producer Paul Hayeland.
Cornell has struggled with a drinking problem, sobering up with the help of Alcoholics Anonymous after her son was born and her family staged an intervention.
She and her colleagues on Too Close for Comfort would ‘go out every night’ and ‘drink like five bottles or something’ during the run of the show, and after her time on the series concluded she took to ‘binge drinking.’
A rock bottom moment came after her son was born, when her mother and uncle came to visit and Cornell was ‘blackout’ drunk while holding her baby.
‘I don’t remember anything to this day. I don’t know how I got to the bottom of the stairs. [My family] took the baby away from me. Just retelling this story makes me cry, but I do it in hopes it will encourage someone to seek help.’
