Louise Fletcher

I remember she played Karen Carpenter's mother in a made-for-TV movie after Karen had died. Other then her Oscar win she really didn't do anything of much substance. She was like a comet - Bang!, and then it's gone.

She is now 83 years old.

She gave a performance of one of the most realistic heart attacks on screen in "Brainstorm", also known for being Natalie Wood's last film.

I wonder what her pussy looks like.

A testament to her greatness in the role is that "Nurse Ratched" has become a widely-recognized archetype. Everyone knows what it means when thrown around as a scornful description.

[quote]Why didn't she do better?

Because everyone confused her with me, and I was better, so I won.

What about her turn as the evil grandmother in the big screen adaptation of Flowers in the Attic????

Her career went exactly nowhere after winning the Oscar for Cuckoo's Nest. Why was that? She was also into that dreadful "Exorcist II: The Heretic" with chubette Linda Blair. She was a good actress; why wasn't she doing better work?

[quote]I wonder what her pussy looks like.

Christ, what an idiot.

Her famous academy award acceptance speech

It would be a fun thread to start. Which Oscar winners did nothing significant after winning? Fletcher I think just got caught up in the OFOTCN sweep. Isabelle Adjani should’ve won. She swept all the critics awards. Other than Adjani and Fletcher (who should’ve been in supporting category but probably would’ve lost to Lee Grant anyway) the category was fairly weak, They weren’t gonna give it to Ann Margret for mostly singing dancing performance (these are rare Oscar wins) . Carol Kane you really felt was just rewarded with the nomination, and Glenda Jackson had two already.

Fletcher might’ve had poor representation too post Oscar win. This would explain the crappy scripts she said yes too but of course she’s partly to blame for doing them.

As was mentioned before, she was wonderful in Brainstorm, where she played a scientist who sacrifice her personal life for her work, and then she died.

^^ She recorded her death experience so others could see what happens when you die.

Here's a photo of Louise with her '70's beau, Moran Mason (son of actor James Mason; husband of singer Belinda Carlisle). She was 20 years, 20 YEARS, his senior at the time.

R14 man that fucker got around. Fletcher and then Carlisle.

Thanks for that posting that Oscar speech. One of the most honestly heartfelt speeches I’ve ever seen. The sign language part got me choked up too.

[quote]Her career went exactly nowhere after winning the Oscar for Cuckoo's Nest.

Oh, it went somewhere.

And it usually involves giant ants, machete wielding psychos and rubber frogs.

I remember her in OFOTCN. I saw 'brainstorm' and she was exactly the same, except she didn't have nasty things to say or do. Same. Woman couldn't act. At all.She was always the same, and that was striking. But that's all she got.

Along with Anna Paquin, one of my two favorite Oscar acceptance speeches.

I thought she was great as Frank Gallagher’s “mother” in Shameless (end of of S1 and a few in S2)

She gave Livia Soprano a run for her money.

She's so great in OFOTCN. That scene towards the end where she stares down Brad Dourif and tells him she's going to tell his mother he's been with a prostitute if he doesn't tell her what happened--she knows exactly that he will commit suicide because of this, but she will win against McMurphy at ANY cost by that point.

So many actresses in Hollywood turned that role down before Fletcher was offered it: Ellen Burstyn, Anne Bancroft, Geraldine Page, Colleen Dewhurst, Angela Lansbury... and of course they were all idiots because it's one of the greatest villain roles of all time.

R21 man I would’ve love to see any of those actresses in the role. They probably thought it was too one dimensional.

She as good in that early 90s mini-series In A Child's Name with DL faves Chris Meloni and Valerie Bertanelli

R14, Morgan, not Moran.

Fletcher was only the 3rd actress (after Audrey Hepburn in Roman Holiday and Liza Minnelli in Cabaret) to win the Oscar, the Golden Globe, and the BAFTA for a single performance.

As great as Adjani is in The Story of Adele H., they were right to give the Oscar to Fletcher. It's an unforgettable performance.

Terrifying and heartbreaking.

Did the Globes have separate categories then, r25? Did Liza win for musical/comedy? If so, which actress won for drama?

R27 yes. And liv ullmann won the drama globe

When Jane Fonda accepted her Oscar for "Coming Home" she used sign language. WTF? I think she said during the speech she did it because 14 million people in the country were deaf. Again: wtf? What the hell did deafness have to do with Jane Fonda? In Louise Fletcher's speech it was a very moving moment when she used sign language because her parents were deaf. Why in hell did Fonda do it? I guess she wanted to make a statement without being political because I think she knew if she started spouting off about Vietnam she'd be booed off the stage. Anyway, Jane Fonda using sign language during her Oscar acceptance speech was REALLY stupid.

This thread sent me to Louise's IMDB page...where I discovered there was a "Stepford Husbands" made for tv film in 1996! Starring DL fave Donna Mills! DL, you have let me down - what are the details of this modern classic?

R29 have you seen her Coming Home win on YouTube? She clearly says while making the film they became more aware of the problems of the handicapped. This was just her way of acknowledging them in her speech.

[quote]So many actresses in Hollywood turned that role down before Fletcher was offered it: Ellen Burstyn, Anne Bancroft, Geraldine Page, Colleen Dewhurst, Angela Lansbury... and of course they were all idiots because it's one of the greatest villain roles of all time.

That character was despised by audiences at the time of the films release. She even made mention of that fact during her speech with the "It seems you all hated me" line. The other actresses were probably worried that playing such a thoroughly unlikeable character would hinder their careers.

Louise was supposed to do Lily Tomlin's role in Altman's Nashville. It was created for her when they worked together on Thieves Like Us. Altman and her at a falling out, and she left to do Cuckoo's Nest. When she accepted the Oscar, she saw Altman in the audience mocking her sign language.

Wasn't she also in Big Eden? I loved that movie when it came out, but only have a vague memory that she was in it. I love the roster of actresses who turned it down, and I know conventional wisdom has it that Lansbury would have finally won her Oscar had she done it, but I wonder if she might have seemed like "too perfect" casting, since her screen work then had usually had her playing villain messes or unsympathetic women. Maybe it needed a comparative unknown on whom the audience could project its own shadowy anima? It would have been interesting to see Lansbury opposite Nicholson and directed by Forman. BAncroft might have seemed like the castrating side of Mrs. RObinson and Page would have brought her ticcing lunatic side.

r32. Poor Bob--never did win a competitive Oscar, did he?

Oscar cursed us...

"This was just her way of acknowledging them in her speech."

It still didn't make any sense. And I don't think Jane Fonda ever gave a flying fuck about the handicapped.

Sigh....the real reward for her was being able to work consistently for nearly 40 years after winning the Oscar. She was a 41 year old tv character actress who had taken a decade off to raise a family and care for a sick husband. It was fletchers then husband who soured the relationship with Altman. No she didn’t reach the heights that she did with cuckoos neat, but she made a great living for many years and even bought a home in the French countryside and has financial security that very few people have.

I think Linda hunt is similar. After the oscar win the big parts didn’t roll in but she worked consistently, made a fortune from voiceover work and is on a show about to go into its 10th season. The work and financial security is the real reward.

Check louise out presenting to Faye at the 1977 oscars. A lot more dolled up and glamorous.

How could parts have "rolled in" for Linda Hunt? Linda Hunt is homely as a horse and midget short. Parts are never going to "roll in" for an actress like that.

If Louise Fletcher was "able to work consistently" than why did she do a piece of shit like "The Heretic?" Seems to me she must have been pretty desperate for work if she agreed to do that excruciatingly bad, humiliating movie.

Look at her IMDB page r39 she worked consistently for nearly 40 years after winning the oscar. Do you think an over 40, 50, 60, 70!year old actress with little name recognition would’ve been able to work that much had she not won the oscar much less been able to buy a high in the French countryside?

You’re missing the point r38. Hunts name comes up consistently in lists of oscar winners who didn’t have great careers after winning. The oscar opened up the door for consistent work and the opportunity to make a great living and have a great life which for someone like LInda hunt is the real reward. That would not have happened had she not won the oscar.

Like many have said, the real treasure is having a career for so long. I mean, looking at her resume, it seems like she hasn't gone a year or two without doing something and that's pretty remarkable.

She was wonderful as Frank's mother in Shameless. I was so surprised to see her pop up and she was a hoot. I also loved her in Flowers in the Attic (weirdly enough, Ellen Burstyn played her role in the recent Lifetime movie, despite being about 30 years too old for it).

The real honor is just being nominated. 21 times!

Strange.how so many actresses were afraid of the role. Nowadays M, G, Jess Our Sally.. Would all jump at the chance.

R40 is blathering like an idiot: "blah, blah, home in the French countryside, blah blah, consistent work, blah blah, great living, blah blah great life, blah blah, financial security." Sounds like this poor soul is truly star struck...over the likes of Louise Fletcher and Linda Hunt! At any rate, who knows how "great" their lives are. And I think as actors go they've made a relatively modest living.

The book "After Midnight" is by Susan Bluestein Davis, the wife of the late Brad David. The memoir is about her life with Davis and about Hollywood in general. She became a successful casting director and was privy to the ups and downs of her husband's career. She stresses than unless you make millions, lots of millions, a year then an actor's life isn't exactly a great big bowl of expensive cherries. That's the reality. I guess some people think if you're a working actor than you're automatically dripping with wealth. But that is definitely not so.

[quote]If Louise Fletcher was "able to work consistently" than why did she do a piece of shit like "The Heretic?" Seems to me she must have been pretty desperate for work if she agreed to do that excruciatingly bad, humiliating movie.

I highly doubt she accepted the role thinking it was going to be a really bad movie! It was the sequel to an enormously successful film, so it looked to be a pretty high profile project. Unfortunately for Fletcher, she turned down the juicy Piper Laurie role in Carrie to do The Heretic.

[quote]Nurse Ratched has been listed multiple times as one of the most terrifying villains in movie history, and its largely because of Fletcher's performance.

I mean no disrespect, but this statement confuses me. I mean, what else WOULD it be based on besides her performance?

R44 actually you sound like a blathering idiot and a fucking moron. Seriously you don’t think that 99% of working actors wouldn’t want the consistent work and paychecks that winning an oscar brought Linda hunt and Louise fletcher? God you’re dumb. Linda hunt has been on a hit tv show for almost a decade and her voiceover work made her a fortune. Modest? Compared to The Rock? Yes, but compared to other working actors and the general population? Uh no.

You think someone who can afford to buy a second home in France has a modest amount of money? Where the heck are you from? There’s no doubt that fletcher or hunt ever made the kind of $$ that big named film or tv stars have made, but sweetie not everyone wants to have an expensive bowl of cherries. Working steadily for years, making more money then most people make and not making shitty financial decisions works out pretty well for most people who are lucky enough to be in that position in life.

Her Pagh is weak. She will not succeed

I remember Linda Blair saying that the script for The Heretic that everyone signed on for was wonderful, but by the time the studio got involved and production was over, it had morphed into something completely different and totally idiotic. It happens a lot more than you'd think. An actor signs on for a thoughtful, intelligent script and, during filming, it gets ruined by too many cooks in the kitchen who keep trying to change it until it turns into a big pile of nothing. To be good, movies need a singular vision that's upheld all the way until the final cut is finished. When each producer wants a different movie or the director doesn't like the script and wants to make something different, it spells trouble.

[quote] I mean no disrespect, but this statement confuses me. I mean, what else WOULD it be based on besides her performance?

No disrespect taken.

I wrote that because some might just say, "It's only because Ken Kesey wrote such a memorable character in the book, not because of how Fletcher played her." But I have seen stage versions of "Cuckoo's Nest" where the actress playing Nurse Ratched was not nearly so memorable as Fletcher.

Believe it or not, her landing "The Heretic" was considered a coup. The role was written for a man but the producers were allegedly so impressed with Fletcher that they made the character a woman.

She was great in Cuckoo’s Nest and deserved her Oscar. I wonder if her career remained at that level because she was so closely identified with that one particular role. Because she hadn’t been well-known before her breakthrough she essentially typecast herself with one great performance.

R47, you are indeed a blubbering, blathering idiot, continuing to bleat about "an Oscar" and "a second home in France" and all that crud. You've definitely got a hard on for Louise Fletcher (!) and Linda Hunt (!), which makes you pathetic and stupid. And how would YOU know anything about the finances of Fletcher and Hunt? How would you know that Hunt made a "fortune" doing voice over work? Sweetie, you don't know a damn thing about their bank accounts. But from the way you're swooning over their supposed fabulous wealth you would think they're drowning in untold millions. Oh in comparison to somebody working at Walmart I guess they've done alright. But as actors their careers have been middling, at best. You sound really stupid carrying on about how well off they are. Maybe you should shut up.

Dial it down, r53. You come across as a nut.

I guess R54 is the one with the hard on for Fletcher and Hunt. What a nut!

I don't think the original script for "The Heretic" was"wonderful", as Linda Blair says. I think it was bad from the beginning and only got worse. I think everyone involved just needed a paycheck. Linda Blair's career was steadily going downhill and she needed a hit movie, and I guess she thought an Exorcist sequel would be a sure thing. Richard Burton was in the throes of alcoholism and was doing any movie solely for the money. Louise Fletcher and Max Van Sydow and Kitty Winn and Ned Beatty obviously needed the work and maybe they too thought that since the movie was a sequel to one of the biggest grossing films of all time it would be a smash . It was a terrible movie from the get go. I think if anyone in the cast had had better opportunities they would never have done what turned out to be one of the worst films ever made.

I don't know if "The Heretic" had anything to do with it, but after that dismal fiasco Kitty Winn made one more movie and then retired from acting altogether. I think maybe the experience with "The Heretic" did something to make her chuck her career, which was a shame because she was a very promising, talented young actress. She did a few theater roles later one but basically retired from acting. I saw her in "Panic In Needle Park" with Al Pacino. She was as good as he was and she won the Best Actress Award at the 1971 Cannes Film Festival.

I would imagine she also made a significent chunk of change for The Heretic. However much it might have sucked, it was a high profile project and Fletcher as a recent Oscar winner would have been a big name. I wouldn't be surprised if it was the biggest paycheck of her career. Heretic might have been Fletcher's post-Oscar win Nicolas Cage moment.

I don't really think it's that surprising. She wasn't young, she had a pleasant enough face but was hardly glamourous or a great beauty... she was a middle aged character actress who lucked out by starring in a BP winner and snagging an Oscar along with the sweep. It was never going to give her the career boost it would some popular, mainstream, YOUNGER star.

Fletcher really did bring Nurse Ratched's evil.

[quote]I don't think the original script for "The Heretic" was"wonderful", as Linda Blair says. I think it was bad from the beginning and only got worse.

And you know this....how? There have been many accounts of the script undergoing several rewrites after production began. Chris O'Neil's character was a major role in the script and it was only last minute that they changed it and brought in Kitty Winn to reprise her role, since Ellen Burstyn refused to do it. Also, Lee J. Cobb's cop character was in the original script, but it had to be significantly reworked when he died before filming began.

[quote]Louise Fletcher and Max Van Sydow and Kitty Winn and Ned Beatty obviously needed the work

This was Fletcher's first film after the wildly successful OFOTCN, so you can hardly say she needed the work at that time. Von Sydow worked steadily after The Exorcist in about 10 films (including Three Days of the Condor and Voyage of the Damned and several successful European films) before signing on for what was essentially a cameo in The Heretic -- doesn't sound like he would have been needy at the time. Ned Beatty's prolific work was all over TV and film place back then, I hardly think he "needed" the work either. This was a high profile project that unfortunately turned into a steaming pile of shit.

Louise merely mimicked my riveting performance as Head Nurse Lucretia Terry, the strict disciplinarian of a mental hospital. She brought nothing new to the table. I did it all a decade before, and much better.

"This was Fletcher's first film after the wildly successful OFOTCN, so you can hardly say she needed the work at that time."

After winning the Oscar she chose THAT for her next movie? Didn't she get any better roles offered to her than that? Actually, I don't think she did. She played a very unattractive, nasty female character in Cuckoo's Nest; I don't think that movie led to her being offered a lot of roles. I think she was stuck in that image, that of Nurse Ratchet, and there weren't too many movies being made that would have a character like that in it.

"And you know this....how? There have been many accounts of the script undergoing several rewrites after production began."

And you know that the script was a masterpiece before the rewrites...how? I don't think mere rewrites would have produced such a colossal, nonsensical mess as "The Heretic." It was probably a mess right from the start and just messier.

And if Louise Fletcher, Max Van Sydow, and Ned Beatty read the script for this thing and STILL agreed to do it then they must have REALLY wanted the paycheck.

All that AND a killer meatloaf recipe, r61!

R59 I somewhat disagree, but let me explain...

What made Fletcher's performance so brilliant was that Nurse Ratched truly wasn't evil. At least she didn't see herself that way, and it was how Fletcher chose to play her. Ratched truly believed she was a good nurse and was doing right by her patients. It was everybody else, especially McMurphy, who saw her as evil. We almost always saw her thru their eyes. But there were one or two scenes where we see her as herself apart from the patients, and in both scenes she displayed a sense of humanity that we didn't see at other times.

I watched the movie again a couple years ago, but having so much life experience since the first time I saw it, had an even greater understanding and appreciation for it. It holds up really well.

Bette Midler should have played Nurse Ratched. No other actress understands subtlety and nuance the way Midler does.

r66, I can see her now, jeering loudly at McMurphy:

"WASSAMATTA, McMurphy?? Ya whinin' ya'd rather have 'a full bottle in front 'a me' than a full frontal lobotomy??? GET THE ICE PICK, BOYS!!!"

R66 You're joking right? I love Bette, but subtle is not a word I'd use to describe one of her performances.

R68 just HAD to ask.

“Ratched, y’got no tits and a tight box.”

“McMurphy, get off m’back!”

What other roles in the first few years after the Oscar could she have played? Hard to think of any.

Maybe Eve in Interiors??

She would have been too young to be believable as Diane Keaton's mom.

Ellen Burstyn did have many good roles in the late 70s either.

They really were similar. I remember as a kid I'd only see bits and pieces of the Exorcist and Exorcist II on TV. (too scared to watch or on too late)

It was years before I realized there were two different women in the films.

didn't

She was great in High School High.