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Forking this off from the "random news stories" category, as there seem to be a lot of them recently.
Obituary - Gena Rowlands
I met her, briefly, at the Egyptian, around 2015 or '16. We had played Opening Night (on 35mm), at which she did a Q & A afterwards. She thought that there was a scene missing from the print, and a manager brought her up to the booth to ask me about it as I was shutting everything down. She was so pleasant to me that I almost felt guilty at having formed the opinion over the previous three hours that Opening Night was one of the most boring, depressing, self-indulgent, and generally f*****g abysmal films I'd ever encountered! The print was in near new condition, with no splices apart from at the starts and ends of each reel (for which the ID frames all matched), and so if the scene she recalled had been removed, it must have been done in post rather than taken out of the actual print.
Obituary - Gena Rowlands
Gena Rowlands, star of A Woman Under the Influence and Gloria, dies aged 94
Hollywood star won three Emmys and two Oscar nominations during a four-decade career
Gena Rowlands, the three-time Emmy winner and dual Oscar nominee, has died at the age of 94.
On Wednesday, the movie star was hailed as one of the United States’ greatest actresses and a leading light in independent cinema,
Rowlands is best known for he roles in A Woman Under The Influence, Gloria, and a part in her son Nick Cassavetes’ blockbuster The Notebook.
Her death was confirmed on Wednesday by representatives of Cassavetes. He revealed earlier this year that his mother had been living for years with Alzheimer’s disease.
She died at her home in Indian Wells, California.
During a remarkable film career, Rowlands and husband John Cassavetees created indelible portraits of working-class strivers and small-timers.
She made 10 films across four decades with Cassavetes, including A Woman Under The Influence, Gloria, Faces, Minnie and Moskowitz, Opening Night and Love Streams.
She earned two Oscar nods for two of them: 1974’s A Woman Under the Influence, in which she played a wife and mother cracking under the burden of domestic harmony, and Gloria in 1980, about a woman who helps a young boy escape the mob.
“He had a particular sympathetic interest in women and their problems in society, how they were treated and how they solved and overcame what they needed to, so all his movies have some interesting women, and you don’t need many,” she said in 2015.
In addition to the Oscar nominations, Rowlands earned three Primetime Emmy Awards, one Daytime Emmy and two Golden Globes.
She was awarded an honorary Academy Award in 2015 in recognition of her work and legacy in Hollywood.
“You know what’s wonderful about being an actress? You don’t just live one life,” she said at the podium. “You live many lives.”
A new generation was introduced to Rowlands in The Notebook, in which she played a woman whose memory is ravaged, looking back on a romance for the ages. The younger version of the character was portrayed by Rachel McAdams.
In her later years, Rowlands made several appearances in films and TV, including in The Skeleton Key and the detective series Monk.
Her last appearance in a movie was in 2014, playing a retiree who befriends her gay dance instructor in Six Dance Lessons in Six Weeks.
She and Cassavetes met at the American School of Dramatic Arts when both their careers were beginning. They married four months later.
In 1960 Cassavetes used his earnings from the TV series Johnny Stacatto to finance his first film, Shadows. Partly improvised, shot with natural light on New York locations with a $40,000 budget, it was applauded by critics for its stark realism.
Rowlands’ big break came when Josh Logan cast her opposite Edward G Robinson in Paddy Chayefsky’s play Middle of the Night. Her role as a young woman in love with her much older boss brought reviews hailing her as a new star.
MGM offered her a contract for two pictures a year. Her first film, a comedy directed by and co-starring Jose Ferrer, The High Cost of Loving, brought Rowlands comparisons to Carole Lombard, one of the great 1930s stars.
But she asked to be released from her contract because she was expecting a baby. Often during her career she would absent herself from the screen for long stretches to attend to family matters.
In addition to Nick, she and Cassavetes had two daughters, Alexandra and Zoe, who also pursued acting careers. John Cassavetes died in 1989.
Hollywood star won three Emmys and two Oscar nominations during a four-decade career
Gena Rowlands, the three-time Emmy winner and dual Oscar nominee, has died at the age of 94.
On Wednesday, the movie star was hailed as one of the United States’ greatest actresses and a leading light in independent cinema,
Rowlands is best known for he roles in A Woman Under The Influence, Gloria, and a part in her son Nick Cassavetes’ blockbuster The Notebook.
Her death was confirmed on Wednesday by representatives of Cassavetes. He revealed earlier this year that his mother had been living for years with Alzheimer’s disease.
She died at her home in Indian Wells, California.
During a remarkable film career, Rowlands and husband John Cassavetees created indelible portraits of working-class strivers and small-timers.
She made 10 films across four decades with Cassavetes, including A Woman Under The Influence, Gloria, Faces, Minnie and Moskowitz, Opening Night and Love Streams.
She earned two Oscar nods for two of them: 1974’s A Woman Under the Influence, in which she played a wife and mother cracking under the burden of domestic harmony, and Gloria in 1980, about a woman who helps a young boy escape the mob.
“He had a particular sympathetic interest in women and their problems in society, how they were treated and how they solved and overcame what they needed to, so all his movies have some interesting women, and you don’t need many,” she said in 2015.
In addition to the Oscar nominations, Rowlands earned three Primetime Emmy Awards, one Daytime Emmy and two Golden Globes.
She was awarded an honorary Academy Award in 2015 in recognition of her work and legacy in Hollywood.
“You know what’s wonderful about being an actress? You don’t just live one life,” she said at the podium. “You live many lives.”
A new generation was introduced to Rowlands in The Notebook, in which she played a woman whose memory is ravaged, looking back on a romance for the ages. The younger version of the character was portrayed by Rachel McAdams.
In her later years, Rowlands made several appearances in films and TV, including in The Skeleton Key and the detective series Monk.
Her last appearance in a movie was in 2014, playing a retiree who befriends her gay dance instructor in Six Dance Lessons in Six Weeks.
She and Cassavetes met at the American School of Dramatic Arts when both their careers were beginning. They married four months later.
In 1960 Cassavetes used his earnings from the TV series Johnny Stacatto to finance his first film, Shadows. Partly improvised, shot with natural light on New York locations with a $40,000 budget, it was applauded by critics for its stark realism.
Rowlands’ big break came when Josh Logan cast her opposite Edward G Robinson in Paddy Chayefsky’s play Middle of the Night. Her role as a young woman in love with her much older boss brought reviews hailing her as a new star.
MGM offered her a contract for two pictures a year. Her first film, a comedy directed by and co-starring Jose Ferrer, The High Cost of Loving, brought Rowlands comparisons to Carole Lombard, one of the great 1930s stars.
But she asked to be released from her contract because she was expecting a baby. Often during her career she would absent herself from the screen for long stretches to attend to family matters.
In addition to Nick, she and Cassavetes had two daughters, Alexandra and Zoe, who also pursued acting careers. John Cassavetes died in 1989.
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