Dixie Carter, Star of Broadway and TV's Designing Women, Dead at 70

Broadway and TV star Dixie Carter, best known for playing wisecracking Southerner Julia Sugarbaker on the sitcom Designing Women, died on April 10, 2010 at the age of 70. Her publicist confirmed the news to the Associated Press, but did not disclose the cause of death.

Hailing from McLemoresville, Tennessee, Carter balanced work on the New York stage with television appearances throughout her career. She made her New York stage debut as Perdita in A Winter's Tale as part of the Public Theater's New York Shakespeare Festival in 1963. A decade later, she returned to the stage to make her Broadway debut in the short-lived 1974 musical Sextet. Two years later, she was honored with a Theatre World Award for Jesse and the Bandit Queen at the Public Theater and also appeared as Melba Snyder in a Broadway revival of Pal Joey. During the same period of time, she appeared on the television soap operas One Life to Live and The Edge of Night.

Between 1978 and 1983, Carter appeared in three plays by playwright Thomas Babe at the Public: Fathers and Sons, Taken in Marriage and Buried Inside Extra. She also began working regularly on television, on shows like The Greatest American Hero, Lou Grant and Diff'rent Strokes, before landing Designing Women, which ran from 1986 to 1993 on CBS.

After Designing Women ended, Carter looked back to the stage for work, returning to Tennessee to play Blanche DuBois in A Streetcar Named Desire in 1993. She made it back to Broadway in 1997, playing Maria Callas in Terrence McNally's Tony-winning play Master Class. Carter appeared on Broadway once more, as Mrs. Meers in the musical comedy Thoroughly Modern Millie in 2004.

Recent regional credits include Lady Windermere's Fan at the Shakespeare Theatre in Washington, D.C., Southern Comforts at the Coconut Grove Playhouse and two shows at the Alley Theatre in Houston, Be My Baby and Aresnic and Old Lace.

Carter received an Emmy Award nomination in 2007 for her work on TV's Desperate Housewives.

Also a cabaret singer, Carter performed regularly at New York's Cafe Carlyle.

She is survived by her husband of 26 years, actor Hal Holbrook, and daughters Mary Dixie and Ginna.