Catherine O’Hara will be remembered for her many iconic roles and accolades in Hollywood, but the actress once shared that her most cherished accomplishment wasn’t one on film at all, but the life she built off camera.
The Home Alone star said she was most proud of being “mother of my children” two years before her death on Friday, January 30, at the age of 71. (O’Hara shared two sons, Matthew and Luke, with her husband of nearly 34 years, Bo Welch, whom she met on the set of Beetlejuice in 1988 and married in April 1992.)
O’Hara told TMZ that her other most cherished role was being “his wife,” while standing alongside a beaming Welch, 74, at LAX in February 2024.
As for getting recognized for her work, O’Hara shared in 2020 that she’d often get approached by fans who would reference her famous Home Alone line, but that ended up changing.
Catherine O’Hara. Getty
“I used to mostly get people named Kevin who’d come up to me and ask me to yell ‘Kevin!’ in their faces,” O’Hara shared with People at the time. “Now it’s mostly about Moira [Rose] and Schitt’s Creek. I’ve never gotten this kind of attention in my life. It’s crazy.”
She portrayed Kate McCallister, the mother of Kevin (Macaulay Culkin), in the Home Alone movies. O’Hara also played Moira Rose in Schitt’s Creek, which had a total of nine Emmy Awards during its run.
More recently, O’Hara notably made appearances in the movie Argylle and on season 2 of The Last of Us.
The Tinseltown icon also attended the 2025 Emmy Awards, where she took home the prize for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series for her role as executive Patty Leigh on The Studio, less than five months before her death.
O’Hara was dressed to impress while celebrating the show’s record-breaking 13 wins in September 2025, wearing a stunning floor-length black peplum gown with a high neckline paired with a matching clutch.
She was also honored with the TIFF Tribute Norman Jewison Career Achievement Award that same month at the 2025 Toronto International Film Festival, where longtime friend and Schitt’s Creek costar Eugene Levy welcomed her to the stage.
“Thank you, darling. Darling Eugene,” she said during her speech. “When I think of my happiest day in this adventure in show business, I realize most of them have been with you.”
Catherine O’Hara and husband Bo Welch in March 2025. Getty Images/Michael Tran / AFP
O’Hara skipped the 2026 Golden Globes, where she had been nominated for her incredible performance on The Studio.
On January 30, Us Weekly learned that paramedics were called to the star’s Brentwood home at 4:48 a.m. that morning for a medical aid call, according to a Los Angeles Fire Department spokesperson, following which she was transported in “serious condition” to the hospital.
O’Hara is survived by her husband and two kids, having celebrated her husband’s 74th birthday exactly two months before her death.
“We’ve been through some dangerous times in our marriage, and thank God we both just really wanted to work on it and stay married,” O’Hara told People in 2024. “I have friends who’ve been divorced and one of them really wanted to work on it and the other didn’t. And you just can’t win.”
“Thank God we both wanted to, when we went through rough times,” she added, noting there is another secret to their long-lasting relationship. “And laughing. Respecting each other and talking, but laughing comes from that too.”
