Diane Ladd Dies: Oscar-Nominated ‘Wild At Heart,’ ‘Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore’ Actress Was 89

Diane Ladd, the Oscar- and Emmy-nominated actress best known for memorable turns in Martin Scorsese’s Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore and David Lynch’s Wild at Heart, died at her home in Ojai this morning, according to her daughter, Laura Dern, who was at her bedside. Ladd was 89.

Dern confirmed the news to Deadline and offered the following statement:

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.

She was the greatest daughter, mother, grandmother, actress, artist and empathetic spirit that only dreams could have seemingly created

Ladd’s first movie role was Roger Corman’s Wild Angels (1966) in which she starred with her first husband, Bruce Dern, alongside Nancy Sinatra and Peter Fonda.

Ladd memorably played Ida Sessions in Roman Polanski’s Chinatown (1974), a pivotal character who helps lead Jack Nicholson’s Jake Giddes to the truth behind the murder of Hollis Mulwray — the film’s central mystery.

That same year, Martin Scorsese’s Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore brought Ladd her first Oscar nomination. In it, she defined the Southern crackerjack Flo, a waitress who works alongside Ellen Burstyn’s Alice. The role was later played on television by Polly Holliday. Ladd received a Best Supporting Actress nomination but lost to the Ingrid Bergman. Ladd did win a BAFTA for her work in the film.

Every Christmas she’s seen in the holiday film, Christmas Vacation with Chevy Chase.

In the early 80’s, returning from starring on Broadway in LuAnn Hampton Laverty Oberlander (part of the Texas Trilogy) for which Miss Ladd received one of the three greatest sets of reviews in the history of Broadway. CBS then enticed her to join the TV series cast of “ALICE” (based on Scorsese’s movie “Alice Doesn’t”) – Not wanting to play Flo again, C.B.S. in co-operation with Diane created the role of the singing-songwriter waitress Belle hailing from Mississippi, (Diane’s choice!) for which she won the Golden Globe award, taking the audience on the first night of her appearance from their amazing 35,000,000 viewers a week to an incredible 75,000,000 weekly viewing audience! She and her father wrote many of the songs that she sang live on the show.

Ladd’s second Oscar Nomination was for the role of Marietta in David Lynch’s Wild At Heart winning France’s Cannes’ Palme d’Or Award; her third Oscar Nomination was for the Film, Rambling Rose, in which she co-starred along with Robert Duval, Lucas Haas, and her daughter, actress, Laura Dern. She and Laura made show business history as the first mother and daughter tandem ever to be nominated for the Oscar for the same motion picture in the same year! Rambling Rose was selected by the late Princess Diana as one of her favorites and given a Royal premiere in London and a party in the Actresses’ honor.