Joyce Jillson, author of a nationally syndicated astrology column who divined the stars on behalf of the Reagan administration and a Hollywood movie studio, died Friday at a Los Angeles hospital. She was 58 and suffered kidney failure following a lengthy illness.

Her daily astrology column appeared in nearly 200 newspapers antionwide, including the Los Angeles Times and the New York Daily News.

As the official astrologer for 20th Century Fox Studios, Jillson consulted on the best opening days for Fox movies. She picked the opening date for 1977’s “Star Wars” – the secondhighest grossing movie of all time.

In the 1970s and 1980s, Jillson made numerous appearances on television and radio shows.Along with Hollywood clients, Jillson also made astrological forecasts for Ford Motor Co. on the introduction of its revamped 1996 Taurus. She claimed that her predictions about the Los Angeles Dodgers as part of her duties at KABC Radio were 89% correct.

For the 2002 Academy Awards, she correctly predicted three of the top five awards, exactly the same ratio as the critic Roger Ebert.

In 1988, Jillson was linked to the Reagan White House after former chief of staff Donald T. Regan wrote in a book that Nancy Reagan consulted astrologers.

Jillson contended she advised Reagan campaign aides to select George H.W. Bush as Reagan’s running mate in 1980. Jillson also said she “spent a lot of time” at the White House after the March 1981 assassination attempt on the president.

While conceding that Nancy Reagan had in fact consulted astrologers,White House spokesmen denied there had been any contact with Jillson and dismissed her as a publicity seeker.

There were also persistant reports, frequently denied, that she had set the timing for Reagan’s first gubernatorial inauguration at a few minutes past midnight on Jan. 2, 1967.

Born and raised in Cranston, R.I., Jillson attended Boston University on an opera scholarship and later moved to New York to begin a stage career.

She won an award as outstanding Broadway newcomer and then moved to Los Angeles to pursue a TV career.

Jillson was a Capricorn, but she regarded herself as a Libra since most of her astrological planets were aligned with that sign.

In addition to publishing books of astrology, Jillson published two books devoted to female mating habits, “Real Women Don’t Pump Gas,” and “The Fine Art of Flirting.”

She described herself as amicably divorced, and leaves no children.

Holiday Mathis, who had been Jillson’s apprentice and editor since 1991, had been co-writing the astrology column the past few months, Creators Syndicate said in a statement.

Joyce and Holiday wrote in advance and the columns they prepared will run through Nov. 6. Starting Nov. 7, the horoscopes will be renamed “Horoscopes by Holiday,” but their format will remain the same.

Two books that she completed are yet to be published, “Dog Astrology,” and “Astrology for Cats.”