Acclaimed Actress Diane Ladd, Celebrated For Her Performance in Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore, Dies at Age 89.
The Oscar-nominated performer the celebrated Diane Ladd passed away 89 years old.
This actress, with credits included National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation, passed away at home at her Ojai, California home. The news was announced in a statement from her daughter, Oscar-winning actor Laura Dern, her daughter.
Dern, who appeared with her mother in various films including Wild at Heart, referred to her as “my wonderful hero plus my special gift as a mother”, noting that she was by her side as she died.
“She was an exceptional grandmother, mother, daughter, star, artist as well as empathetic spirit that only dreams could have seemingly created,” she wrote. “We were fortunate to know her. She is now with the angels.”
Beginnings and Breakthrough
The start of her career included supporting roles in TV shows including The Fugitive and the seventies featured her performing with actor Jack Nicholson in Chinatown.
In the same year, 1974, she performed with actress Ellen Burstyn in Martin Scorsese’s celebrated dramatic comedy Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore, a classic. The performance brought Ladd an Academy Award nomination for best supporting actress.
1980s and Beyond
During the eighties, she appeared in crime thriller Black Widow as well as comedy sequel Christmas Vacation and also took part in the show Alice, a comedy program inspired by the film Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore.
In the subsequent decade, she was given another supporting actress Academy Award nomination for her performance in David Lynch’s Wild at Heart, a cult classic where she played the mom of her real-life daughter Dern’s character. A year later she was awarded an additional nod for her performance in Rambling Rose, another movie that also featured her daughter.
“This movie which Princess Diana selected as her very favorite, and she flew me and Laura to London for a royal premiere and an event dedicated to us,” Ladd said of Rambling Rose. “And she sat between us, holding both our hands, and crying, viewing our performance.”
The 1990s included parts in comedy Cemetery Club reuniting her with Ellen Burstyn, the movie Primary Colors, a political comedy, with John Travolta and Payne’s Citizen Ruth where she acted as Laura Dern’s mom another time. The decade also brought her TV award nominations for roles in Dr Quinn, Medicine Woman, Grace Under Fire, a sitcom plus Touched by an Angel.
Working with Laura Dern
She kept appearing with her daughter in dramatic comedies Daddy and Them, a movie, David Lynch’s Inland Empire, a surreal film and White’s comedy-drama series Enlightened. She was also seen alongside Sandra Bullock in the film 28 Days, Anthony Hopkins, a legend in that movie plus Jennifer Lawrence in Joy.
Her later TV roles included Ray Donovan, a drama and Young Sheldon.
Behind the Camera
She also authored and helmed the comedy Mrs Munck, a film which starred her and previous spouse actor Bruce Dern. “Bruce is a talented star,” she noted. “I’m privileged to have directed him on a project. In fact, I’m the only woman in recorded history to helm a film with her ex. I humorously say: ‘I advise females, should you desire retribution, guide your former spouse.’ Though I’m just teasing.”
Personal Connections
Ladd was also a relative of the great Tennessee Williams, whom she described as “a major inspiration throughout my life”.
In 2018, Ladd was misdiagnosed with a respiratory illness and advised she had just six months to live but made a full recovery once her daughter transferred her to a new hospital.
“When you use your pain and not let it back up similar to a wound, rather utilize it to explore, to make the path clearer for personal and collective growth, then you are succeeding,” Ladd said.
