Louise Fletcher, 88, Dies; Oscar Winner for ‘One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest’

She become in large part unknown to the general public whilst she become solid as what the American Film Institute known as one in every of cinema`s maximum memorable villains.Louise Fletcher, the imposing, steely-eyed actress who received an Academy Award for her function because the tyrannical Nurse Ratched in “One Flew Over the Cuckoo`s Nest,” died on Friday at her domestic withinside the city of Montdurausse, in Southern France. She become 88.

The demise become showed via way of means of her agent, David Shaul, who did now no longer cite a cause. Ms. Fletcher additionally had a domestic in Los Angeles.

Ms. Fletcher become forty and in large part unknown to the general public whilst she become solid as the top administrative nurse at an Oregon intellectual group in “One Flew Over the Cuckoo`s Nest.” The film, directed via way of means of Milos Forman and primarily based totally on a famous novel via way of means of Ken Kesey, received a great-actress trophy for Ms. Fletcher and 4 different Oscars: great picture, great director, great actor (Jack Nicholson, who starred because the rebellious intellectual affected person McMurphy) and great tailored screenplay (Bo Goldman and Lawrence Hauber).

Ms. Fletcher`s recognition speech stood out that night — now no longer simplest due to the fact she teasingly thanked citizens for hating her, however additionally due to the fact she used American Sign Language in thanking her parents, who had been each deaf, for “coaching me to have a dream.”