Rosemary Murphy, actress in 'To Kill a Mockingbird,' dies at 89

Rosemary Murphy, a Broadway and film actress known for her role in "To Kill a Mockingbird" and for her Emmy-winning performance in the TV drama "Eleanor and Franklin," died July 5 at home in New York, said her agent, Jonathan Mason. She was 89 and had been diagnosed in June with esophageal cancer.

In the 1962 classic "To Kill a Mockingbird," Murphy played the sympathetic part of Miss Maudie Atkinson, neighbor to widower lawyer Atticus Finch, played by Gregory Peck, who becomes a pariah in an Alabama town for defending a black man accused a raping a white woman.

In an emotional scene late in the film, Maudie comforts Finch's son, Jem, telling him, "There are some men in this world who are born to do our unpleasant jobs for us. Your father's one of them."

In the early 1950s, Murphy played roles on dramatic live television shows, such as "Robert Montgomery Presents," and began racking up credits on Broadway.

In the 1976 "Eleanor and Franklin," Murphy played Sara Roosevelt, the iron-willed, controlling mother of FDR.

Murphy worked through the 1990s on television, appearing in several TV movies and in "Frasier" and other series.