The news that we have to share saddens us to no end. But let it be known that Emmy-nominated actress Barbara Bosson has passed away at the age of eighty-three. Bosson was broadcasted into millions of homes across America for the role she rose to fame for. She played divorcee Fay Furillo in the hit television show for NBC called Hill Street Blues, which was co-created by her then-husband Steven Bochco.
Bosson’s death was announced on social media this past Monday by her director son, Jesse Bochco. Her beloved son shared the sad news that his Emmy Award-nominated mother had passed away via a touching Instagram post to his friends and followers on the Facebook-owned social media platform.
“More spirit and zest than you could shake a stick at. When she loved you, you felt it without a doubt. If she didn’t, you may well have also known that too. Forever in our hearts. I love you, Mama,” Jesse Bochco wrote in an Instagram tribute to his deceased mother.
In another post that he shared via Instagram Stories, Bocho shared an image of his mother holding him as a little baby. He wrote, “Rest easy, mom,” to caption the touching photo that showed his mother holding him when he was just a wee baby boy.
In addition to Barbara Bosson’s work on the drama Hill Street Blues, she also famously played roles for other shows co-created by Bochco, like Hooperman, Cop Rock, and Murder One, which were all famous series on the ABC network.
Bosson earned her Emmy Award nomination for her role of prosecutor Miriam Grasso for the ABC series Murder One.
Bosson was born on November 1, 1939, in Charleroi, Pennsylvania. She was raised by a dedicated family in Belle Vernon. When she was a late teen, she moved to Florida with her family.
When she graduated high school, Bosson applied for college classes in the drama department of Carnegie-Mellon. She was accepted into the prestigious program but was unable to pay the tuition. Instead of going to acting school the traditional way, she moved to New York City, where she took acting classes while paying her bills with a secretary job at the American Conservatory Theater as well as working as a Playboy Bunny.
“I put up with a lot of leering men to be able to study acting,” Bosson told the St. Petersburg Times in 1990.
Barbara later attended university in the 1960s. During her studies, she met Steven Bochco, who would later become her husband. They married in 1970 and stayed together until their divorce in 1997. Bochco died in 2018 at the age of seventy-four after a battle with leukemia that ultimately took his life.
Prior to landing the roles that would make her famous, Barbara Bosson got her start in a Steve McQueen film entitled Bullitt. She also played a role in a CBS detective show called Mannix.
In an interview with the Los Angeles Times in 1985, Bosson admitted that she got the Hill Street Blues role because she was married to the show’s co-creator.
“It hurts me to believe that maybe everything that was good was because of Steven,” she said.
