{"id":2439,"date":"2023-01-31T14:22:19","date_gmt":"2023-01-31T14:22:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/foreverinourhearts\/?p=2439"},"modified":"2023-03-16T20:07:09","modified_gmt":"2023-03-16T20:07:09","slug":"remembering-the-life-of-laverne-shirley-actress-cindy-williams","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/foreverinourhearts\/2023\/01\/remembering-the-life-of-laverne-shirley-actress-cindy-williams.html","title":{"rendered":"Remembering the Life of &#8220;Laverne &#038; Shirley&#8221; Actress Cindy Williams"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure id=\"attachment_2457\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-2457\" style=\"width: 768px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><a href=\"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/399\/2023\/01\/cindy-williams-04_credit-everett-collection-scaled.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-2457\" src=\"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/399\/2023\/01\/cindy-williams-04_credit-everett-collection-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"cindy williams\" width=\"768\" height=\"576\" \/><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-2457\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">The Everett Collection<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Cindy Williams, who starred in\u00a0\u201cLaverne &amp; Shirley,\u201d\u00a0died at 75 following a brief illness, according to her family. Williams portrayed Shirley alongside Penny Marshall\u2019s Laverne on\u00a0the popular sitcom.<\/p>\n<p>The family\u2019s spokesperson, Liza Cranis, released a statement on behalf of Williams\u2019 children. The statement reads, \u201cThe passing of our kind, hilarious mother, Cindy Williams, has brought us insurmountable\u00a0sadness that could never truly be expressed. Knowing and loving her has been our joy and\u00a0privilege. She was one of a kind, beautiful, generous and possessed a brilliant sense of humor\u00a0and a glittering spirit that everyone loved.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>It continues, \u201cWe have always been, and will remain, SO proud of her for many things&#8230;her lifelong mission to rescue animals, her prolific artistry, her faith, and\u00a0most of all, her ability to make the world laugh! May that laughter continue in everyone because\u00a0she would want that. Thank you for loving our Mom; she loved you too.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Williams also starred in director George Lucas\u2019 1973 film \u201cAmerican Graffiti\u201d and director Francis Ford Coppola\u2019s \u201cThe Conversation\u201d in 1974. But she was by far best known for \u201cLaverne &amp; Shirley,\u201d the \u201cHappy Days\u201d spinoff that ran on ABC from 1976 to 1983 and that, in its prime, was among the most popular shows on TV. Williams played the moralistic Shirley to Marshall\u2019s more libertine Laverne on the show about roommates who worked at a Milwaukee bottling factory in the 1950s and 60s.<\/p>\n<p><iframe title=\"YouTube video player\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/mRmKzxhMzwo\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>Williams made a few guest appearances on \u201cLaw and Order: SVU,&#8221; \u201c7th Haven,\u201d and \u201c8 Simple Rules\u201d in her acting career. Other television roles include \u201cThe Odd Couple,&#8221; \u201cA Dream of Christmas,&#8221; \u201cSam and Cat,\u201d and \u201cGetting By and Normal Life.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Williams was known for a few other things outside her acting career. The actress expressed her strong faith in God in some interviews during her career and in her book, \u201cShirley, I Jest: A Storied Life.\u201d In 2015, Williams spoke of her belief in God when her book came out in interviews connected to the book\u2019s release. In an interview with <em>Psychology Today, <\/em>Williams said, \u201cWell, I was just born with it. He was always present. So if it was imbued in my spirit, I mean, it gets really heady.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>She added, \u201cI don\u2019t know how I can talk about this, but God was imbued in me from the time of my birth, and me in Him. And I just had this sense of always being all right, even though the situation might be dire.\u201d She said that even \u201cwhen horrible things would befall me, I still felt that presence, that spirit of unconditional love. I always like to think of Him as a person, as my father in heaven or as my God, but he doesn\u2019t care.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Williams described going to Sunday school as an \u201cescape\u201d from her father\u2019s alcoholism. She wrote in her book, \u201cI learned all of my Bible stories. I loved all of the powerful images and escaped into them. Jesus and Moses and the great people in the Bible. For that hour in Sunday school, I was safe.\u201d Cindy Williams leaves behind two children, Emily and Zach Hudson.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Cindy Williams, who starred in\u00a0\u201cLaverne &amp; Shirley,\u201d\u00a0died at 75 following a brief illness, according to her family. Williams portrayed Shirley alongside Penny Marshall\u2019s Laverne on\u00a0the popular sitcom. The family\u2019s spokesperson, Liza Cranis, released a statement on behalf of Williams\u2019 children. The statement reads, \u201cThe passing of our kind, hilarious mother, Cindy Williams, has brought us&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":657,"featured_media":2457,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fbia_status":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[121,122],"tags":[714,717],"class_list":["post-2439","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-celebrity","category-entertainment","tag-cindy-williams","tag-laverne-shirley"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Remembering the Life of &quot;Laverne &amp; Shirley&quot; Actress Cindy Williams<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Cindy Williams, an actress best known for her role as Laverne on the sitcom &quot;Laverne &amp; Shirley,&quot; passed away after a brief illness at 75.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" 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