Rest in peace, Gena Rowlands, who died August 14, 2024, at 94.
Sadly, she suffered from dementia for the past five years, the same fate as her character in The Notebook, a film that wound up becoming her most famous.
Before that, going back to the late '50s, she — frequently with first husband John Cassavetes — had helped to define the U.S. indie film scene, with scorchingly raw performances in many of his finest films, chiefly A Woman Under the Influence (1974), Opening Night (1977) and Gloria (1980).
Rowlands also had a somewhat overlooked important career on TV, especially on early TV. She had been a rare surviving regular of a '50s series (Top Secret, 1954-1956) and was a hoot on Peyton Place (1967) as a bitchy socialite. She went on to play Betty Ford and, with Jane Alexander, to portray one half of a lesbian couple who were raising children, the latter of which was beyond progressive for television 40 years ago.
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She was Oscar-nominated twice, won three Emmys, a Daytime Emmy and a Golden Globe. Thankfully, she was given an honorary Oscar in 2015, the year she quit acting.
In 2016, I was lucky enough to attend her Q&A at a screening at the Metrograph and was one of the few able to ask her a question:
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