Dana Wynter

The Associated Press

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Dana Wynter, who ran from the Pod People in the 1956 science-fiction classic "Invasion of the Body Snatchers," has died in Southern California. She was 79.

Her son, Mark Bautzer, told the Los Angeles Times the actress died Thursday in Ojai of congestive heart failure.

Wynter, who starred in a number of television dramas in the 1960s, was best known for her role as Becky Driscoll in director Don Siegel's paranoid film about townspeople being replaced by emotionless duplicates grown from plant-like pods.

Born in Germany, Wynter grew up in England and studied to be a doctor before turning to acting.

She appeared with Robert Lansing in the ABC series "The Man Who Never Was," and starred in "Wagon Train," "Cannon" and "The Rockford Files."