Brady Bunch star Ann B Davis dies at 88

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Ann B Davis in 2003Image source, Reuters
Image caption,

The Brady Bunch star also won two Emmys for sitcom The Bob Cummings Show

Ann B Davis, the American actress best known for her role as Alice Nelson, the housekeeper in the TV series The Brady Bunch, has died at the age of 88.

A medical examiner in Texas said Ms Davis had died on Sunday morning.

US media reports said she had fallen in her home. An autopsy is scheduled for Monday.

The Brady Bunch ran from 1969 to 1974. Ms Davis won two Emmy Awards for an earlier role in the sitcom The Bob Cummings Show.

Image source, Rex Features
Image caption,

The Brady Bunch, with Ann B Davis back left, ran from 1969 to 1974

A friend of Ms Davis, Bishop William Frey, told CNN she had fallen and hit her head, and suffered a subdural hematoma from which she never regained consciousness.

The Brady Bunch was unusual at the time in focusing on a non-traditional family but was never controversial.

It charted the marriage of a widow bringing up three daughters with a widower and his three sons.

Ms Davis once wrote of the show: "Wouldn't we all love to have belonged to a perfect family, with brothers and sisters to lean on and where every problem is solved in 23 and a half minutes?"

Her role as Charmaine "Schultzy" Schultz on The Bob Cummings Show ran from 1955 to 1959.

It earned her a Hollywood Walk of Fame star in 1960, in addition to her two Emmys.