Diane Ladd, the three-time Oscar-nominated actress for “Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore”, “Wild at Heart” and “Rambling Roses,” died Monday morning at her home in Ojai, California, a representative for her daughter Laura Dern confirmed to Variety. Mr. Ladd was 89 years old.
Laura Dern said in a statement: “Diane Ladd, my great hero and profound gift of motherhood, walked past me this morning at her home in Ojai, California. She is the best daughter and mother. She was a great grandmother, an actress, an artist, and had the kind of empathetic spirit that only a dream could create. We were blessed to have her and she is now flying with the angels.
The prolific Rudd has painted a vivid persona throughout her career, and while her family is notable for being in the industry, the number of times she has performed with her daughter is unusual.
Laura Dern’s father Bruce Dern, who was married to Rudd in the 1960s, said in a statement: “Diane is a wonderful actress and I feel like she was a bit of a hidden gem until she met David Lynch. “When we cast her to play Laura’s mother in At Heart, we felt like the world really understood her greatness. She has been a valuable and authentic addition to her decades as a SAG executive.” From an actress’s point of view, she saw everything as it was. She was funny, smart, and kind. And to me, she was a wonderful mother. I will be forever grateful for that. ”
Rudd was nominated for an Oscar for Best Supporting Actress for Martin Scorsese’s 1974 film Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore, in which she memorably played the rustic and colorful waitress Flo. In David Lynch’s 1990 feature film Wild at Heart, Rudd played Laura Dern’s nefarious mother with a touch of the Wicked Witch of the West. And in Martha Coolidge’s Rambling Rose, set in Georgia in 1935, Rudd played Dern’s sexually adventurous Rose’s defender rather than Dern’s character’s mother, and both Rudd and Dern received Oscar nominations.
In fact, Rudd and Dern’s nomination for Rambling Rose is the only time a mother and daughter have been nominated for the same film. Peter Travers of Rolling Stone said that in Rambling Rose, Rudd “welcomed feminist elements to the role”, and in Wild at Heart, he wrote that Rudd “squeezes out a compelling role with scene-stealing enthusiasm”.
Judith Crist reviewed Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore for New York Magazine, writing about “Diane Ladd’s wonderful performance as the foul-mouthed waitress colleague in Heart of Gold.”
Rudd and Dern most recently co-starred in the 2011-2013 HBO series “Enlightened,” in which Dern starred as Amy, a self-destructive executive who tries to rebuild her life after falling into despair. Rudd played Helen, a mother with whom she has an uneasy relationship. Rudd had a chance to shine on the series with the episode “Consider Helen” that brought her to the forefront.
Most recently, in the 2015 film Joy, directed by David O. Russell and starring Jennifer Lawrence, Rudd played the beloved grandmother of Lawrence’s title character and provided tender narrative narration.
Rudd had a small but important role in the 1974 neo-noir classic Chinatown as Ida Sessions, a sex worker with a SAG card who poses as Evelyn Mulwray in order to lure Jack Nicholson’s Jake Gitz into the Hollis Mulwray case and the nefarious case of the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power.
Rudd played the wife of Gene Hackman’s character in the 1981 Hackman and Barbra Streisand vehicle “All Night Long.” Rudd played the mother of Clark Griswold (Chevy Chase) in National Lampoon’s Vacation (1989) and the mother of Jack Stanton (John Travolta), a lightly fictionalized version of Bill Clinton, in Primary Colors (1998).
Other big screen credits include “Something Wicked This Way Comes.” Bob Rafelson’s “Black Widow.” “Private Clothes” by Martha Coolidge. 1992’s Hold Me Thrill Me Kiss Me was a screwball comedy in which she played a flirtatious but aging Southern belle alongside her own mother, Mary Lanier. “Cemetery Club” (Rudd played a Jewish widow with Ellen Burstyn and Olympia Dukakis); “Mississippi Ghosts” Sandra Bullock’s rehabilitation drama “28 Days.” Anthony Hopkins vehicle “The World’s Fastest Indian.”
Rudd and her first husband, actor Bruce Dern, welcomed a daughter, Laura Dern, on February 10, 1967, but the couple divorced in 1969.
Laura Dern appeared in several of Rudd’s films as a child, uncredited. The two later co-starred in Wild at Heart and Rambling Roses, before co-starring in Alexander Payne’s abortion comedy Citizen Ruth, in which Dern headlined and Rudd had an uncredited cameo. The two had a major role (albeit starring Dern) in the 1996 CBS television movie The Siege of Ruby Ridge, and they starred again as mother and daughter in Billy Bob Thornton’s 2001 country comedy Daddy and Them. Dern starred in Showtime’s health care film Damage Care (2002), with Rudd in a supporting role. The pair returned to the world of David Lynch in the very strange Inland Empire. Dern starred as an actress who blends into her character, and Rudd had a cameo role in what J. Hoberman described as a “nasty TV gossip.”
Rudd tried his hand at directing in 1995 with Showtime’s Mrs. Mank, an adaptation of the novel by Ella Levland. She played opposite ex-husband Bruce Dern in the movie.
Rudd has also worked extensively on television, receiving three Emmy Award nominations. In 1994, she appeared as a guest actress on the comedy series Grace Under Fire. In 1997, she appeared as a guest actress in the drama series Touched by an Angel.
Rudd, who played Flo in Scorsese’s Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore, also appeared in a CBS sitcom based on the film Alice, but in a different role. Waitress Belle Dupree appeared on the TV series Flo, played by Polly Holliday, for one season from 1980 to 1981, when it was spun off.
She was previously part of the cast of the soap opera ‘The Secret Storm’. Rudd also starred in the 2004 horror miniseries “Stephen King Presents Kingdom Hospital” and guest starred in series such as “L.A. Law,” “ER,” and “Cold Case,” as well as appearing in numerous television movies.
Rose Diane Radnier was born in Meridian, Michigan, but moved to New York City when she was still a teenager. Rudd worked as a model and dancer at the Copacabana nightclub before making her stage debut in Tennessee Williams’ “Orpheus Descends.”
In 1961, Rudd made his debut in his first feature film, Something Wild. The actress made her television debut appearing in the late 1950s episode “The Scent of Death” on the television series The Big Story.
Her first feature film roles were uncredited, including “Murder, Inc.” and “Forty Pounds of Trouble.” She appeared with Bruce Dern in Roger Corman’s 1966 biker film “Wild Angels,” which inspired Peter Fonda to make “Easy Rider.” She also appeared in Mark Rydell’s “The Reivers.” “WUSA” directed by Paul Newman. And just before “Chinatown,” there was the Burt Reynolds vehicle “White Lightning.”
Rudd’s short story collection A Bad Upon for a Piece of Cake was published in 2013.
She was married three times, first to Bruce Dern from 1960 to 1969 and to William A. Shea Jr. from 1969 to 1977. She married her third husband, Robert Charles Hunter, in 1999. Hunter died in July at the age of 77.
Rudd is survived by his daughter Laura Dern and two grandchildren.
