Diane Ladd, Oscar-nominated actress, died at the age of 89 on November 3, her daughter Laura Dern confirmed in a statement. “My amazing hero and my profound gift of a mother passed with me beside her this morning at her home in Ojai, California,” Dern shared with Vulture. “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.” Ladd was nominated for three Best Support Actress Oscars throughout her life, for roles in Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore, Wild at Heart, and Rambling Rose. Dern co-starred with Ladd in all three films and earned a Best Actress Oscar nomination herself with Rambling Rose. It was the first time that both a mother and a daughter were nominated for Academy Awards for the same film.
Born in Laurel, Mississippi, on November 29, 1935, Ladd was interested in acting from a young age, even turning down a college scholarship to pursue the craft. Creativity is in her genes as a second cousin of Tennessee Williams. She met her first husband, Bruce Dern, in 1959 as co-stars in Williams’s play Orpheus Descending, her Off Broadway debut. They married the following year, and she later co-starred alongside Dern again in her first film, Wild Angels, in 1966. They had two daughters, Diane Elizabeth, who died at 18 months in an accidental drowning, and Laura.
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In 2018, Ladd was misdiagnosed with lung disease and thought she had six months to live; doctors told her that going on walks would help improve her condition. With Laura Dern’s help, the two began walking every day and eventually recorded their intimate conversations, which spanned subjects from Ladd’s divorce from Bruce Dern to her sister’s death. “As parents we do not tell our children all of our truths because we want to be loved and respected. So honestly, we lie a little,” Ladd said in 2023 when their conversations were adapted into a memoir, Honey, Baby, Mine. “What I discovered is that there were things I hadn’t told her that I should have because I felt it would make her feel guilty or burdened. Instead, it was a release for her.”
