Where Is the Cast of Kate & Allie Now? From Jane Curtin to the Cast Member Who Left Hollywood to Become a Nurse

Jane Curtin as Allie Lowell

Curtin found success thanks to her role in the very first cast of Saturday Night Live. After Chevy Chase left, Curtin took over as host of Weekend Update, and her iconic characters included Enid Loopner and Prymaat Conehead. 

But, she told PEOPLE in 1984, she was never sure she quite fit in with the SNL mystique. “Here I was, this nice Catholic girl, and suddenly I’m this rock ‘n’ roll cult figure,” she said. “After the show I’d just go home to bed, while everybody else kept partying.”

Curtin left the show in 1980. She married Patrick Lynch in 1975, and they welcomed their daughter Tess in 1983.

After Kate & Allie, Curtin’s next big role was as Dr. Mary Albright on 3rd Rock from the Sun, which ran from 1996 to 2001. She played the human love interest of John Lithgow’s Dick Solomon, an alien who becomes a physics professor. She said in 1999 that unlike Kate & Allie, Rock is “not about relationships or anxiety about who you are. We’re just having a good time.”

Curtin has continued to work widely, with spots on shows like Unforgettable, The Librarians, The Good Fight and The Residence. Her film roles include 2013’s The Heat, 2018’s Can You Ever Forgive Me? and 2023’s Jules.

Susan Saint James as Kate McArdle

Saint James was a TV veteran by the time she landed on Kate & Allie. She won an Emmy in 1969 for her work on The Name of the Game and was nominated two more times. She also starred in the TV series McMillan & Wife.

When hosting SNL in 1981, Saint James met executive producer Dick Ebersol. They wed that same year and welcomed three sons: Charles, William and Edward (nicknamed Teddy). Saint James also had two other children, Sunshine and Harmony, who she shared with ex Tom Lucas.

Of Kate & Allie, Saint James told PEOPLE in 2000, “It was so ahead of its time. Two women living together with kids — it was a solution.”

After Kate & Allie, the actress mostly stepped back from her acting career. She made guest appearances on shows including The Drew Carey Show, Law & Order: Special Victims Unit and Suits. Saint James was also an early and longtime supporter of the Special Olympics.

In 2004, Dick, Charles and Teddy were on a private plane that crashed during an attempted takeoff. Teddy died, as did the pilot and flight attendant.

Ari Meyers as Emma McArdle

Meyers played Kate’s daughter, Emma. She was an only child raised by a single mom and told PEOPLE in 2000 that she really embraced her fictional siblings. “We’d hang out all day and come home and talk on the phone,” she said of Allison Smith, who played Allie’s daughter Jennie. “My mom was like, ‘What could you possibly have to say to each other?’ ”

Meyers left Kate & Allie before the final season to attend Yale, where she majored in philosophy and theater. “We were so proud of her,” Saint James told PEOPLE.

After her college graduation, she returned to acting, appearing in various TV series and on the show Diagnosis: Murder. She also performed audiobooks.

Meyers explained during a 2021 digital reunion with the cast that she left acting to become a nurse. “I love it,” she said, revealing she had been a nurse for five years.

Frederick Koehler as Chip Lowell

Koehler played Allie’s son on the show. He first found success as a child actor in the 1983 film Mr. Mom. On Kate & Allie, he often spent time playing with Saint James’ kids. “I remember being happy,” he told PEOPLE in 2000 about his time on the show.

After Kate & Allie ended, he went to college at Carnegie Mellon, graduating with a degree in drama in 1997. “I wanted to explore more what it was to be an actor,” he says, “and not rest on the things I’d already done,” he told PEOPLE in 1999.

He did theater in New York and Los Angeles; Curtin told PEOPLE that when she saw him perform in Los Angeles, “It was as if I was his mom, the pride I felt. He has grown into this together, young man.” In 1999, he appeared on HBO’s Oz.

He has continued to work as an actor, starring in the Death Race film series and appearing on TV shows like Castle, Lost, Criminal Minds, American Horror Story and 9-1-1.

Allison Smith as Jennie Lowell

At age 9, Smith starred on Broadway in Evita, and a year later, she took over the title role in Annie. She continued to work regularly after Kate & Allie ended, with guest roles on shows like Party of Five, Homicide: Life on the Street and Beverly Hills, 90210.

She appeared in 11 episodes of The West Wing as Mallory O’Brien, the daughter of John Spencer’s Leo McGarry. By then, most people didn’t associate her with Kate & Allie. When people would ask about her career, she told PEOPLE in 2000, “I say, ‘I was on this show Kate & Allie.’ And everyone’s like, ‘That was you?’ ”

Smith has also appeared on shows like Providence, Numb3rs, Family Guy and the revival of Will & Grace.

“People still tell me how important it was for them to see a different kind of family on TV when they were growing up,” Smith told Generation X Wire in 2025. “Especially those who had divorce in their family. All the kids on Kate & Allie came from broken families and Susan had a few marriages.” She noted to the outlet that she and Meyers are still close friends.

Smith married Randy Grimmett in 2001. They share two daughters.

In 2021, Smith and Grimmett bought the Stonover Inn in Lenox, Mass., and moved there full-time from Los Angeles. She told The Berkshire Eagle she was hoping to act more on the stage and was working on a debut novel.

Sam Freed as Bob Barsky

Freed ultimately played Allie’s boyfriend Bob, a retired football player who becomes a sportscaster. But before he landed Bob, he appeared on the show two other times. The show’s staff liked him so much, producer Bill Persky told PEOPLE in 1988, that “any time they wanted to cast a character, somebody would say, ‘Let’s bring Sam Freed back. We can dye his hair or give him a scar.’ ”

He was happy for the steady work, telling PEOPLE, “I have lost roles in auditions because I reminded somebody of a brother-in-law they didn’t like. Regardless of what you do, it’s how you are received.”

Freed actually knew Curtin from her pre-SNL days, when they were in an improv troupe together.

Freed also starred in the short-lived TV adaptation of Ferris Bueller as the title character’s dad and starred in the fifth season of The Wire. He also appeared widely in the Law & Order franchise and had guest spots in shows like Person of Interest, Elementary, The Blacklist and House of Cards.

Freed married actress Barrie Youngfellow, best known for starring in It’s a Living, in 1983.

Youngfellow died in 2022, after 39 years of marriage.