Lynn Loring, Search for Tomorrow Star, Producer, Mr. Mom, Dead at 80

Lynn Loring, a former actress turned producer, who started her show business career as Mary Stuart‘s (Jo) daughter Patti on Search for Tomorrow has died. She passed away at the age of 80 on December 23 at Providence Cedars-Sinai Tarzana Medical Center after a series of chronic illnesses.

In Memoriam

Chris Thinnes, Loring’s son with actor Roy Thinnes (ex-Phil, General Hospital; ex-Sloan, One Life to Live), confirmed the news of his mother’s passing to the Hollywood Reporter just last month.

Born Lynn Eileen Zimring, Loring was born in Manhattan on July 14, 1943. Her dad, Charles Zimring, was a New York shipyard owner; her mother, Barbara Loring, was a publicist.

Loring, who took her mother’s maiden name professionally, began modeling when she was a mere 3 years old. She started doing commercials for RCA Victor. Loring was just 7 years old when she joined Search as Patti. She played the part for a decade. Upon graduating from the Calhoun School for Girls, she enrolled in Barnard College.

Her other credits include the feature film Splendor in the Grass, and the TV series Wagon Train, The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis, Gunsmoke, and Perry Mason. Loring took on the role of Betty Harrington in Return to Peyton Place. She left acting in the mid-1970s to raise her family. Loring returned to the TV world four years later, this time as a casting director for NBC’s big-budget failed series, Supertrain.

Loring next went to work for Aaron Spelling as a producer on 1979’s The Return of the Mod Squad, which reunited former rebels turned law officers Pete, Julie, and Linc, played by Michael Cole, Peggy Lipton, and Clarence Williams III, and The Best Little Girl in the World, which starred Jennifer Jason Leigh in a story about teenage anorexia. Next, Loring became a vice president of development and talent, motion pictures and television.

It was in this role that she produced the Michael Keaton hit film Mr. Mom in which he played a stay-at-home parent after his wife, played by Teri Garr, went back to work. While doing his housework, Keaton’s character, Jack Butler, became a devotee of Young and the Restless during Nikki (Melody Thomas Scott) and Victor’s (Eric Braeden) early romance. The film grossed over $120 million on a $5.5 million budget.

She also produced for Spelling the TV-movie The Making of a Male Model which starred Joan Collins (Alexis, Dynasty) and the late Jon-Erik Hexum (Voyagers!). Loring later became a development executive at MGM-UA Television. There, she developed the TV series In the Heat of the Night, starring Carroll O’Connor (All in the Family), which was based on the Oscar-winning film.

Loring was second in command to MGM/UA Television Productions chairman and CEO David Gerber. This made her one of the highest-ranking female executives in Hollywood.

Loring and Roy Thinnes wed in 1967. They divorced in 1984. She wed attorney Michael Bergman in 1988. In addition to her son, Chris, she is also survived by a daughter, Casey-Leigh. Soap Hub sends sincere condolences to Loring’s family at this difficult time.