LOS ANGELES (AP) — Louise Fletcher, the late-blooming star whose riveting performance as the cruel and calculating Nurse Ratched in “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest” set a new standard for movie villains and won her an Oscar, died hours later. age 88.
Fletcher died in her sleep surrounded by family at her home in Montdurausse, France, her agent David Shaul told The Associated Press on Friday. No cause was given.
Having put her career on hold for years to raise children, Fletcher was in her early 40s and little known when she was cast opposite Jack Nicholson in the 1975 film by Miloš Forman, who had admired her work the previous year in director Robert . Altman’s “Thieves Like Us”. Little did she know at the time that many other prominent stars, including Anne Bancroft, Ellen Burstyn and Angela Lansbury, had turned her down.
“I was the last person cast,” she recalled in a 2004 interview.
“One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest” became the first film since 1934’s “It Happened One Night” to win Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor, Best Actress and Best Screenplay.
Clutching her Oscar at the 1976 ceremony, Fletcher told the audience, “It looks like you all hate me.”
She then addressed her deaf parents in Birmingham, Alabama, speaking and using sign language: “I want to thank you for teaching me to have a dream. You see my dream come true.”
After a moment of silence, thunderous applause followed.