Beloved actress admits ‘I was a long-term drug addict’

You probably loved her as the anti-housework housewife Peg Bundy on Married … with Children.

But actress Katey Segal was hiding personal struggles behind her wisecracks, as she reveals in her memoir, which was released today.

Grace Notes: My Recollections is a series of essays written by Segal that cover her 15-year addiction to diet drugs, cocaine and alcohol, as well as her cancer diagnosis at age 28 and her experiences becoming a mother again with the help of a surrogate at 52.

The New York Post published an extract from Grace Notes, in which the 63-year-old recalls being childhood friends with Judy Garland’s daughter.

“When I was 12, we lived on the same block as Judy Garland. Her daughter Lorna Luft and I became neighbourhood buddies,” she writes, according to the NYP. “Lorna’s mom had a lot of pills on her bedside table and slept past noon, just like my mom. We hung tight. And, of course, I thought everyone’s mom took a lot of pills.”

She also tells how winning a Golden Globe for her role in Sons of Anarchy opened new doors in Hollywood.

“Dame Helen Mirren talked to me like we were old friends, even though we’d never met,” she describes.  “Anne Hathaway chased me down and leapt into my arms, letting me know how happy she was to see me.”

The actress was honoured with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 2014 for her work on Married … with Children, which co-starred Christina Applegate, above left, as Peg’s sultry daughter Kelly, Ed O’Neill as her long-suffering husband Al, and David Faustino as their hapless son Bud.

Originally a singer who worked as a back-up for Bette Midler and Etta James, Segal scored her first major role in the series Mary, starring Mary Tyler Moore.

Her star-making turn as Peg Bundy followed, and more recently she’s appeared in hit TV series Glee and The Big Bang Theory and the movie Pitch Perfect 2.

She won her Globe in 2011 for her portrayal of the matriarch Gemma Teller Morrow in the crime-drama series Sons of Anarchy, which ran from 2008 to 2014.

Do you remember Katey Segal as Peg in Married … with Children? Would you be interested in her memoir?