Actress Diane Ladd, who received several Oscar and Emmy nominations during her multi-decade career, has died. She was 89.
Ladd’s daughter, actress Laura Dern, broke the news of Ladd’s death in a statement to The Hollywood Reporter on Monday.
“My amazing hero and my profound gift of a mother, Diane Ladd, passed with me beside her this morning, at her home in Ojai, Ca.,” Dern wrote. “She was the greatest daughter, mother, grandmother, actress, artist and empathetic spirit that only dreams could have seemingly created. We were blessed to have her. She is flying with her angels now.”
A cause of death has not been reported.
Ladd’s career on the screen began in the 1950s and ’60s, when she made a string of one-episode appearances on shows like “Stanley,” “Hazel,” “The Fugitive,” and “Ironside,” among others. Though she later pivoted to film, she also kept up a substantial TV resume over the years. Notable roles included diner waitress Belle Dupree on the CBS sitcom “Alice” (which won her a Golden Globe in 1981); Helen Jellicoe, mother of Dern’s Amy Jellicoe, on the HBO dramedy “Enlightened”; and, most recently, matriarch Nell O’Brien on Hallmark Channel’s “Chesapeake Shores.”
Ladd also racked up three Primetime Emmy nominations for guest appearances on “Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman,” “Grace Under Fire,” and “Touched by an Angel.”
On the film side, Ladd received three Oscar nods throughout her career, for her work in 1974’s “Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore” (which was later adapted into CBS’ “Alice” series; Ladd played Flo Castleberry, the character later portrayed by Polly Holliday on TV), 1990’s “Wild at Heart” (which starred Dern opposite Nicolas Cage), and 1991’s “Rambling Rose” (which starred Dern opposite Robert Duvall).
Ladd’s many big-screen credits also included “National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation,” “Chinatown,” “Ghosts of Mississippi,” and “28 Days.”