Iconic 1970s sitcom star who also won a Tony Award is unrecognizable at 86… but can you guess who she is?

An iconic ’70s sitcom star was unrecognizable when she showed up in Los Angeles this week at age 86.

Born in Maine, she initially had a successful career on Broadway before moving to Hollywood to make it on television.

She became a small screen sensation thanks to the television comedy Alice, which was based on Martin Scorsese’s film Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore.

After the show, she returned to the New York stage and won a Tony Award for Neil Simon’s beloved play Broadway Bound.

She looked bright and cheerful when she stepped out in California this week, wearing a stylish floral blouse and high-slit pants.

Who is she?

It concerns Linda Lavin, who played the title role in the hit CBS sitcom Alice for nine seasons from 1976 to 1985.

The television program was an adaptation of the 1974 film Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore, directed by Martin Scorsese.

Ellen Burstyn starred in the film as a recent widow with a young son who moves to Arizona and goes to work in a restaurant.

Eventually, she starts a relationship with one of the restaurant’s young patrons, played by rock star and actor Kris Kristofferson.

Alice, the sitcom adaptation, ran for more than 200 episodes, starring Linda in the lead role, amid a cast that included Philip McKeon as her son Tommy.

Linda was born into a Russian Jewish family in Portland, Maine. She enjoyed a musical background as her mother was an opera singer.

She began her career on the stage in New York, where she appeared in the 1968 Broadway shows It’s a Bird…It’s a Plane…It’s Superman.

Her first performances included The Mad Show, an off-Broadway revue inspired by Mad magazine, in which she sang Stephen Sondheim’s parody of Antonio Carlos Jobim’s classic bossa nova number The Girl From Ipanema.

Appearing in California this week, she cut a sprightly, cheerful figure, wearing a stylish floral blouse with youthful jeans

She is Linda Lavin, who played the title role in the hit CBS sitcom Alice for nine seasons from 1976 to 1985

Alice, the sitcom adaptation, ran for more than 200 episodes, starring Linda amid a cast that included Philip McKeon as her son Tommy

In 1970, she received her first Tony nomination for Neil Simon’s Last Of The Red Hot Lovers, in which she starred opposite Doris Roberts and James Coco.

However, she only achieved real national fame after she moved to Los Angeles in the mid-1970s to act on the silver screen.

One of her early breakthrough roles on television was a recurring role as a detective in the first two seasons of the police series Barney Miller in 1975 and 1976.

In 1976 she got the role that would make her name. For nine years she played Alice on CBS and in 1979 she was nominated for an Emmy.

After the series ended in 1986, she made her grand return to the Great White Way in Broadway Bound, the final play in a semi-autobiographical trilogy by Neil Simon.

Linda played a character loosely based on the playwright’s mother and won the 1987 Tony Award for Best Featured Actress in a Play.

One of her early breakthrough roles on television was a recurring role as a detective in the first two seasons of the police series Barney Miller in 1975 and 1976

In 1987, the year after Alice ended, Linda won a Tony Award for her role in Neil Simon’s play Broadway Bound, in which she is pictured with Jonathan Silverman

She also kept up the pace on television, playing guest roles on beloved shows such as The Sopranos (pictured), The OC, Bob’s Burgers and The Good Wife.

She continued to act on Broadway and received another Tony Award nomination in 1998 for her performance in The Diary Of Anne Frank, starring a then 16-year-old Natalie Portman in the title role.

Linda also replaced Madeline Kahn in The Sisters Rosensweig, the hit play by Broadway star Wendy Wasserstein.

She also kept up the pace on television, playing guest roles on beloved shows such as The Sopranos, The OC, Bob’s Burgers and The Good Wife.

This year she filmed a pilot episode titled Mid-Century Modern, Ryan Murphy’s gay take on The Golden Girls starring Nathan Lane and Matt Bomer.

In her private life, she was divorced twice: first from her Broadway colleague Ron Leibman and then from her Alice colleague Kip Niven.

Since Valentine’s Day 2005, she has been happily married to Steve Bakunas, an actor 20 years her junior who has appeared in series such as One Tree Hill.