Carole Cook, a veteran actress beloved for her work on stage and screen, with credits including the 1984 John Hughes comedy “Sixteen Candles,” has died, according to a statement from her agent, Robert Malcolm. She was 98. Malcolm told CNN via email that Cook died “peacefully” on Wednesday from heart failure.

In addition to an illustrious career onstage, where she originated the role of Maggie Jones in the 1980 Broadway musical “42nd Street,” Cook enjoyed over 60 screen credits. TV legend Lucille Ball initially took Cook under her wing. She later credited Ball with giving her her “big break.”

“I had no place to live in California, so I lived in Lucy’s guesthouse until I got settled,” Cook told the website Queer Voices in 2019. “She changed my name. I was born Mildred Frances Cook, but Lucy didn’t think it was a good show business name. She gave me the name Carole after Carole Lombard. Lucy said to me, ‘You have the same healthy disrespect for everything in general, just like Lombard.'”

The “I Love Lucy” star brought Cook from Ohio, where she was doing theater, to Hollywood to be part of Ball’s DESILU theater’s musical revue. “We’ve been friends for several years,” Ball said during an appearance on the game show “Password” with Cook in 1965.

Ball and Cook remained life-long friends, with Ball even appearing as Cook’s matron-of-honor at her 1964 wedding to Tom Troupe. Cook starred in “The Incredible Mr. Limpet,” “Palm Springs Weekend,” and “American Gigolo.” She worked alongside Molly Ringwald, portraying Grandma Helen in “Sixteen Candles,” and shared the screen with Jamie Lee Curtis and Patrick Swayze in Grandview, U.S.A.

Carole appeared on multiple episodes of “Dynasty,” “Cagney & Lacey” and “Murder, She Wrote,” and had a stint on the popular medical drama, “Grey’s Anatomy.” With dozens of TV gigs on her resume, she also found fame on stage. Cook followed Carol Channing and was cast as the second actress to play the lead role of Dolly Levi in “Hello, Dolly!”

Cook created the role of Maggie Jones in multiple companies of the Tony award-winning musical “42nd Street,” and also originated the role of Blanche Daly in Broadway’s “Romantic Comedy.” She starred in the national tour of “Steel Magnolias,” where she received a Helen Hayes Theatre Award nomination.

Cook was also an active advocate for HIV/AIDS charities. The Broadway star spent over 30 years working with S.T.A.G.E. LA, a musical theater benefit for HIV/AIDS, and performed annually at San Francisco’s Help Is On The Way benefit, an organization honoring the founder’s sons, who died of the virus.

In 2019, she was honored with her own plaque on the “Palm Springs Walk of Stars” and was recently the recipient of the Texas Cultural Trust 2023 Texas Medal of the Arts award for “Lifetime Achievement in Theater.” Cook, who would have turned 99 on Jan. 14, is survived by her husband, Tom Troupe, son Christopher, his wife Becky, her sister Regina Cocanougher, and nieces and nephews.