Tyne Daly is part of a Hollywood dynasty: her parents were actors, her brother Tim Daly is an actor and all three of her daughters — Kathryne, Alisabeth and Alyxandra Brown — grew up on Hollywood sets and have creative careers.
The six-time Emmy winner is most famous for her role in Cagney and Lacey, the 1980s crime drama focusing on detectives Mary Beth Lacey (Daly) and Christine Cagney (Sharon Gless). But long before starring in the series, she married actor and director Georg Stanford Brown in 1966, when she was 19 and he was 22. “I looked at this guy and said: ‘There’s the father of my children. I’d better go introduce myself.’ That was clear as crystal,” Daly told The New York Times in 2014.
The pair was married for 24 years and welcomed three daughters together: Alisabeth, born in 1967; Kathryne, born in 1971; and Alyxandra, born in 1985.
“I love being different,” Daly told PEOPLE in 1977. “I’ve been stared at first with my father, then with my husband. Now it’s with my kids or because I’m an actress and people think they recognize me. That’s fine with me.”
Keep reading for everything to know about Tyne Daly’s three daughters.
Alisabeth Brown, 56
Alisabeth was born on Dec. 12, 1967, in New York City. At the time, her young parents were still struggling to establish their careers and struggled financially. “Roaches crept out of the cereal we’d been eating all week,” Daly said of their first apartment, talking to PEOPLE in 1977. “There’s nothing glamorous about starving.”
When she was young, Alisabeth briefly worked in movies, working as a production assistant on Sister Act and as a production secretary for Vietnam War Story and Club Life. Recently, she’s come back to film, working as a creative producer on the independent film Mink River.
According to her biography for the movie, Alisabeth was a serious dancer when she was younger. “Modern dance formed her early years as an artist; she began studying at age 5 and continued a rigorous practice for over 16 years,” it reads. “Although she had serious aspirations to make dance her life’s work, she did not feel at home within the narrowly defined criteria for ‘fitting into’ the predominantly white institutions.”
Today, Alisabeth is a visual artist working in sculptures and glass. “Her love of honing technique with the freedom that her foundation of dance afforded her, is similar to her relationship to materials and conceptual ideas in that she prioritizes experimentation and exploration with all of her projects,” her bio states.
She’s lived in New York and Los Angeles in the past, but now resides in Santa Fe, New Mexico. “I had only spent a total of two weeks in Santa Fe before moving here, and I had little sense of what it had to offer me,” Alisabeth told Santa Fe Found in 2018. “But coming here, it kind of feels like a haven to me, and I’ve definitely fallen in love with it. Santa Fe is such a great place to operate from. I still have those moments where I feel restless or wander-lusty, when I think I’m going to move to Europe, but if I have to be functional, operational, and meeting responsibilities for my family, this is a great place to do that from.”
Kathryne Brown, 53
Kathryne was born on Feb. 10, 1971, in Los Angeles. Like her older sister, she grew up around film sets.
In a 1985 PEOPLE profile of Daly and Gless, focusing on Cagney and Lacey, Kathryne and Alisabeth were on set with their mom. During the interview, Daly was playing music from The Beatles. “My daughter Kathryne is reintroducing me to the Beatles,” she said in the story.
Kathryne started acting as a teenager, and she even made an appearance in a Cagney and Lacey TV movie with her mother. She also appeared on several episodes of Daly’s show Judging Amy, and has been directed in television episodes by her father.
“I practically grew up on the back lot, being around actors, watching my parents do it,” Kathryne said in a conversation with Brown for Backstage. “I’ve wanted to act since I was five.”
“It was hard for me to say I wanted to be an actor; I thought I would be judged because of my family,” she added. “When I decided one day that I was going to go to New York and get into an acting school, I remember you were like, ‘No. Stay in college.’ Later you changed. But you did give me a bit of a lecture: ‘You’re a woman, you’re Black. Black women don’t have a lot of possibilities in this industry. It’s going to be hard. Why not stay in college?’ ”
Kathryne also described feeling the pressure of her family’s accomplishments. “My grandfather had a saying, ‘Don’t go degrading the family,’ ” she said. “It’s sort of a joke, but it sort of isn’t. So, you know, it’s a lot of pressure. The family is actually scarier to me than critics.”
Kathryne has two daughters, Posy and Poppy, and lives in Los Angeles. On her Medium blog, Kathryne describes herself as “a single mom who lives in Hollywoodland. I’ve been a somewhat successful actor, a baker, a preschool teacher, a cancer survivor and a lifelong contrarian.”
In 2021, she posted a photo of her daughters on Instagram, captioning it, “These two: my all; my reason. #nationaldaughtersday #posypie #poppyhope 💕.”
That same year, she also posted a photo of her and Alisabeth as kids in honor of her sister’s birthday, captioning it, “Happy Birthday to one of my favorite people on this planet. My #bestiesincebirth @littlebigheadb 🤎.”
Alyxandra Brown, 38
Alyxandra was born Oct. 1, 1985 in Los Angeles. As an adult, she goes by “Xan.”
And while she’s not an actor like her parents and sisters, she’s following her creativity and artistic nature as a baker, running a business called Five Petal Creations with her husband Mark in Canada.
The cakes they bake use family recipes, which they describe as “heirlooms of love.”
“While living in my hometown of Los Angeles, my sister introduced me to the owners of The Village Bakery and Café,” she writes in her 2020 bio on the bakery’s website. “Working with Barbara and her team gave me experience and skills I use to this day.”
“Fast forward several years to living in Canada … I met the person who would change my life forever,” the bio continues. “During a spontaneous three-day first date, we learned how much we had in common – he a cook working towards his Red Seal, me a baker and student, both lovers of travel, food, and movies, and both with the desire to one day own a little something of our own.”
It adds: “We’re two kids and a house deep now and – with the advent of the pandemic – it seemed like the time to start making our dreams reality. [Now, the couple has three children: Roscoe, Evelyn and Theia.] We’re working hard and starting small. Putting love and joy into every cake, cookie, and spice mix. Bringing a bit of professional charm to our home-baked treats and a little decadence to your weekend.”
Source: People
