Friends actress Teri Garr dies aged 79

She also appeared in Young Frankenstein and Tootsie

Garr passed away due to complications from multiple sclerosis (MS), her manager Heidi Schaeffer said on Tuesday.

She was best known for her roles in Young Frankenstein, Tootsie, and Friends, in which she played Phoebe Abbott, the estranged birth mother of Lisa Kudrow's Phoebe.

Garr appeared in three episodes of the iconic sitcom in 1997 and 1998.

Her career spanned more than four decades, and she earned an Oscar nomination for best supporting actress for her role in 1982 film Tootsie.

But it was for her role in Mel Brooks' hit comedy Young Frankenstiein that Garr is arguably best known.

She played Inga, a Transylvania local who becomes the assistant to Gene Wilder's Dr Frederick Frankenstein, in the classic film which also starred the likes of Cloris Leachman, Marty Feldman and Gene Hackman.

Along with her role in Friends, Garr made a number of appearances and cameos in TV series, including Men Behaving Badly, Sabrina the Teenage Witch and ER.

She was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis in 2002, and five years later underwent surgery for a brain aneurysm.

Garr went on to become a key advocate for MS awareness, speaking to doctors and patients across the US about her experiences with the illness, NBC reports.