In Memoriam: Gena Rowlands
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Actress Gena Rowlands, who starred in films like A Woman Under the Influence and The Notebook, died on Wednesday, August 14, 2024, after a five-year battle with Alzheimer’s. She was 94 years old.
Rowlands was known for playing heroines who overcome difficult situations, earning two Academy Award nominees during her career. The first was for Woman Under the Influence, in which she played a lonely, emotional housewife who descends into madness. Her second Oscar nod was for playing a determined and feisty child protector who pushes back against the mob in Gloria. Later in her career, Rowlands starred in The Notebook as an elderly woman with dementia who is told the story of her life.
She was born Virginia Cathryn Rowlands on June 19, 1930 in Madison, Wisconsin. Rowlands was attending the University of Wisconsin, but left early to study acting at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts in New York. Her stage career included an 18-month run performing in Middle of the Night as a young woman who falls for an older man.
Rowlands’ onscreen career began with an episode of Top Secret, then she had her first feature film in The High Cost of Living in 1958. Her early projects included Lonely are the Brave, episodes of 87th Precinct, The Spiral Road, Tony Rome, she starred in the TV series Peyton Place, Machine Gun McCain, and Two-Minute Warning.
She was married to director John Cassavetes who directed several of her movies, including A Woman Under the Influence and Gloria, as well as Shadows, A Child is Waiting, Faces, Minnie and Moskowitz, Opening Night, and Love Streams.
Rowlands starred opposite Bette Davis in Strangers – The Story of a Mother and Daughter, she was in Tempest, Light of Day, and she won an Emmy for portraying the first lady in The Betty Ford Story. Her work in the late ‘80s and ‘90s included Another Woman, Once Around, Night on Earth, Silent Cries, Something to Talk About, Hope Floats, and Playing by Heart.
She starred in films directed by her son, Nick Cassavetes, including Unhook the Stars, She’s So Lovely, and The Notebook. Her later roles included Hysterical Blindness, Taking Lives, The Skeleton Key, and her final role was in the 2017 short film Unfortunate Circumstances.
Rowlands received an honorary Oscar in 2015 at the Governors Awards.
