Acclaimed Actress Diane Ladd, Known For Her Role in Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore, Dies at the Age of 89.

This Oscar-nominated actor Diane Ladd, a Hollywood veteran passed away 89 years old.

The actor, whose filmography spanned Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore, left this world in her residence at her Ojai, California home. Her passing was shared through a message by her daughter, Oscar-winning actor Laura Dern, her daughter.

Her daughter, who performed alongside her mother in several movies including Rambling Rose, described her as “my wonderful hero plus my precious gift being my mom”, writing that she was present as she died.

“She was the most wonderful daughter, mother, grandmother, actress, artist along with compassionate soul that seemed almost dreamlike,” she wrote. “We were blessed to have her. She is now with the angels.”

Initial Roles and Major Success

Ladd’s early career featured small roles on television series such as Perry Mason whereas the 1970s had her appearing alongside Jack Nicholson in the film Chinatown.

That very year, 1974, she appeared with actress Ellen Burstyn in Martin Scorsese’s acclaimed dramatic comedy the movie Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore. The performance earned Ladd her first Oscar nomination in the supporting actress category.

1980s and Beyond

During the eighties, she starred in crime thriller Black Widow and humorous film Christmas Vacation and appeared on Alice, a comedy program derived from the film Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore.

During the next ten years, she earned an additional best supporting actress nomination for her performance in David Lynch’s Wild at Heart where she played the mom of her biological child Dern’s character. The next year she was awarded another nomination for her performance in the film Rambling Rose which included her daughter.

“This movie that Princess Diana picked as her top choice, and she invited me and Laura to the UK for a special screening and a celebration in our honor,” Ladd said of Rambling Rose. “And she sat between us, taking our hands, and weeping, viewing our performance.”

The nineties featured performances in humorous films Cemetery Club, a film reuniting her with Burstyn, the movie Primary Colors, a political comedy, with John Travolta and Alexander Payne’s Citizen Ruth, a dark comedy where she acted as Dern’s mother another time. The decade also earned her Emmy nominations for roles in the series Dr Quinn, Medicine Woman, Grace Under Fire, a sitcom and Touched by an Angel.

Working with Laura Dern

She continued to star alongside her daughter in comedy drama Daddy and Them, a movie, the David Lynch project Inland Empire, a surreal film and the series by Mike White dark comedy series Enlightened. She was also seen next to actress Sandra Bullock in the film 28 Days, Sir Anthony Hopkins in The World’s Fastest Indian, a film and with Jennifer Lawrence in Joy, a biographical drama.

Her more recent television parts consisted of Ray Donovan and Young Sheldon, a comedy.

Writing and Directing

She also authored and helmed the humorous movie Mrs Munck which starred Diane Ladd and previous spouse Bruce Dern, an actor. “Bruce is an excellent performer,” she noted. “I’m privileged to have directed him in a movie. In fact, I stand as the only woman in recorded history to helm a film with her ex. I make a joke: ‘I tell women, if you want revenge, direct your ex-husband.’ But I’m only kidding.”

Personal Connections

She happened to be a relative of Tennessee Williams, who she called “a major inspiration on my life”.

In 2018, doctors misdiagnosed Ladd with a respiratory illness and advised she only had half a year left yet she recovered completely once her daughter shifted her to a new hospital.

“When you use your pain and avoid letting it accumulate like a sore or something, instead apply it to explore, to clarify the journey for yourself and others, then you are winning,” Ladd expressed.