[1] A former silver screen starlet, she was best known for her starring role as Joanne on the CBS/NBC soap opera Search for Tomorrow, which she played for 35 years without interruption (1951–86).

[2][1] After her divorce from her first husband, with whom she raised two children, she began a side career as a guitarist and a singer-songwriter, first singing on Search for Tomorrow and then releasing her own album in 1973.

At the time of her death, she had played the role of Meta Bauer on the CBS soap opera Guiding Light for six years.

Stuart was the first actress to have her real life pregnancy written into the show, and was filmed at the hospital after giving birth to her son in 1956.

[6][1] In 1953 she was named Favorite Daytime TV Serial Actress by Radio-TV Mirror magazine for her role in Search for Tomorrow.

Her roles were usually small, but sometimes with leading actors of the time, including Ronald Reagan in The Girl from Jones Beach, Errol Flynn in Adventures of Don Juan, Clark Gable in The Hucksters, Esther Williams in This Time for Keeps and Henry Fonda and Lucille Ball in The Big Street.

[5] In 1956, Stuart recorded "Joanne Sings," an album of songs for children from the perspective of her Search for Tomorrow character.

Executive producer Paul Rauch offered her the role of the crooked Judge Webber on ABC's One Life to Live which she played in 1988, then settled into retirement, having worked nearly 40 years.

[citation needed] Stuart started the New York Chapter of SAG-AFTRA Foundation Book PALS, which stood for Performing Artists for Literacy in Schools.

[6] In 1996, she came out of retirement and accepted the role of Meta Bauer, Ed's aunt who became a confidante of his daughter, Michelle, on Guiding Light, a part which had been played earlier by Ellen Demming.

In the 1960s, Stuart wrote on her struggles with mental health medicating by drinking "two Martinis" and taking "two five-milligram tranquilizers" daily.

Stuart wrote that this incident spurred a moment of suicidal ideation, writing "I was treading water at the bottom of a well, and I needed help."

Cynthia graduated from the North Carolina School of the Arts and became a journalist writing for the Detroit Free Press She also followed in her mother's footsteps as an actress for a time.

[20] An apron Stuart wore while playing Jo on Search for Tomorrow currently hangs in the National Museum of American History at the Smithsonian in Washington, D.C.[21]