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This Academy Award-nominated performer Diane Ladd left us 89 years old.

The star, with credits spanned National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation, left this world in her residence in Ojai, California. The news was shared in a statement from her daughter, award-winning actress Laura Dern, her daughter.

Her daughter, who appeared with her mother in a number of films including Wild at Heart and Rambling Rose, described her as “my amazing hero plus my profound gift being my mom”, writing that she was present as she died.

“She was the greatest daughter, mother, grandmother, performer, creative along with compassionate soul that seemed almost dreamlike,” she wrote. “We were lucky to have her. She is now with the angels.”

Initial Roles and Major Success

The start of her career featured supporting roles in TV shows like The Fugitive while that decade featured her performing with actor Jack Nicholson in Chinatown.

That very year, the year 1974, she performed alongside Ellen Burstyn in Scorsese’s praised comedy drama Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore. The performance landed Ladd her first Oscar nomination for best supporting actress.

1980s and Beyond

Throughout the 1980s, she appeared in the dramatic film Black Widow plus funny follow-up National Lampoon’s holiday comedy while also joining Alice, a comedy program based on Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore.

In the following decade, she earned an additional best supporting actress nomination for her performance in David Lynch’s the movie Wild at Heart where she acted as the parent of her real-life daughter Dern’s character. A year later she received a further nomination for her acting in the film Rambling Rose which also starred Dern.

“This was the film which Princess Diana selected as her very favorite, and she invited Laura and I to the UK for a special screening and a party dedicated to us,” Ladd said of Rambling Rose. “She positioned herself between us, holding both our hands, and weeping, watching us perform.”

That decade included parts in the comedy Cemetery Club, a film bringing her back with Ellen Burstyn, Primary Colors, a political story, a satirical film, featuring John Travolta and Alexander Payne’s the movie Citizen Ruth where she acted as the mother of Dern once more. The decade also earned her Emmy nominations for work in the series Dr Quinn, Medicine Woman, Grace Under Fire, a sitcom and Touched by an Angel, a drama.

Partnerships with Her Daughter

She kept appearing with Laura Dern in dramatic comedies Daddy and Them, the David Lynch project Inland Empire and Mike White’s comedy-drama series Enlightened, a TV series. She also appeared alongside actress Sandra Bullock in 28 Days, a movie, Anthony Hopkins, a legend in The World’s Fastest Indian plus Jennifer Lawrence in Joy, a biographical drama.

Her later TV roles featured the series Ray Donovan plus Young Sheldon.

Behind the Camera

Ladd also wrote and oversaw the comedy Mrs Munck that included herself and ex-husband Bruce Dern. “Bruce is a great actor,” she noted. “I’m privileged to have directed him in a movie. Indeed, I stand as the only woman in recorded history to direct her ex-husband. I often joke: ‘I advise females, should you desire retribution, helm a movie with your ex.’ Though I’m just teasing.”

Family Ties

She happened to be a relative of Tennessee Williams, whom she described as “a major inspiration throughout my life”.

In 2018, doctors misdiagnosed Ladd with a respiratory illness and advised she had just six months to live yet she recovered completely once her daughter transferred her to a different hospital.

“Should you harness your suffering and avoid letting it accumulate like a sore or something, instead use it to explore, to illuminate the way for you and those around, then you are triumphing,” Ladd said.