Married…with Children star, 72, debuts major transformation 30 years on from hit show

Married…with Children star Katey Sagal looked so different from her famous sitcom character Peggy Bundy as she arrived at New York Comic Con on Saturday, dressed in a stylish black and white look.

The 72-year-old stunned in black pants, a white collared shirt, and a black buttoned-up jacket, which she paired with black boots. She left her dark brunette locks down in a layered style and accessorized with tinted, black-rimmed glasses.

It was a far cry from her Married…with Children costume, which consisted of bold, sky-high red hair and tight, loud clothing. 

The show ran from 1987 to 1997, and made superstars out of Katey and her co-stars, Ed O'Neill, Christina Applegate and David Faustino.

The truth behind Married…with Children

Despite the show's success, Katey later shared that the script was rife with misogyny, something which she was forced to grapple with as one of the lead actors.

"It was a very misogynistic show. It was when I really, clearly understood that my job as an actor was to interpret the material," she said in AOL's Build Series. "It's not necessarily my belief system. My belief system has nothing to do with being an actor. You know, I was hired to play a part."

"Suddenly, it dawned on us that this is not just a satire to everybody," she continued.

"Some people are really, truly relating to this, and that's when I would get these very serious questions about a show that was really only meant to be funny. It was meant to be funny and to entertain and to laugh at ourselves. And I always got it as that, but some people took it really seriously."

After the show wrapped, Katey went on to enjoy an incredibly successful career, with roles in 8 Simple Rules, Sons of Anarchy, Futurama, The Conners and Lost. 

She also welcomed three children: Sarah, 32, and Jackson, 30, whom she shares with her ex-husband, Jack White, and Esmé, 19, whom she welcomed with her husband, Kurt Sutter.

Katey's sobriety journey 

Her children were by her side as she celebrated a major milestone in August, and took to Instagram with several snaps from her party. "Me…last night…celebrating 40 years of continuous SOBRIETY, surrounded by like-minded friends, my amazing husband, and these three loves of my life," she wrote in the caption. "Grateful beyond…It's a wonderful life."

Katey started using drugs and alcohol at just 15 years old, and got sober in 1986. "I'm a person that for probably the first 30 years of my life, didn't deal with [expletive]," she said on Christina Applegate's MeSsy podcast. "I medicated myself to where I didn't really deal with my emotions."

"My parents died, I had cancer in my 20s, I mean, a bunch of [expletive] happened, and I didn't really deal with it. Then I stopped medicating myself, and now I have no choice but to deal with it."

"What I have found around community, around all that, is I know lots of people that have walked through everything I've walked through. The opposite of addiction is community," she added.