In “Moonstruck,” (1987), Olympia Dukakis earned an Academy Award for her part as a mother of sardonic wit. She passed away on Saturday at the age of 89.
Agent Allison Levy is the nephew of Michael Dukakis. He noted that she was in poor health for several months before she passed away. She took her last breathe in her New York City home on Saturday morning. Sitting on her mother’s lap was Christina, the daughter.
Indirectly or indirectly, Dukakis received her increased visibility after the character Dukakis appeared as the mother of Cher’s character in Moonstruck at the age of 56.
![Olympia Dukakis Dead: Oscar-Winning 'Moonstruck' Actress Was 89 – Deadline](https://deadline.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/Olympia-Dukakis.jpg)
Dukakis shot up into the limelight with the character in the movies “Look Who’s Talking,’ and its sequels, as well as in “Ms. Steel Magnolia,” (1997) with Shirley MacLaine, and “Mr. Holland’s Op’s, (2001) with Richard Dreyfuss.”
Dukakis, a world-class deadpans, has been awarded three Emmys since the year 2000.
She won most notably in Norman Jewison’s 1962 movie “Moonstruck,” where she played Rose Castorini, a physically unattractive Brooklynite with a successful husband (Vincent) and a single mother who has an affair with her brother’s disinterested opera-head (Lirio) who gets over her lovelorn bookkeeper (Glennis) (Nicolas Cage).
It was during the scene in which she berated her daughter about her boyfriend’s dissection in the kitchen that Dukakis’ creative wit was shown.
It’s beginning to look like your life is going down the drain.
At another point, she states that it’s good that she didn’t love her husband because it meant she wasn’t emotionally vulnerable to him. The simple truth is that what people want to believe isn’t always simple.
“Moonstruck,” was among the best romantic comedies of the 80s. It won three Oscars and receiving three nominations in additional categories. In addition, it was one of the most profitable films of that year.
In accepting her Oscar in April of that year, upon the Republican nominee’s campaign, Jane Fonda said she was thanking Jewison, her husband, members of the creative community, and others.
After that, she held up the statuette and said, “Michael, let’s get ready.”
Though George H.W. Bush won the presidential nomination, Michael Dukakis lost the general election to Democrat B.Dukovsky, Jr. like her cousin. Olympia Dukakis, supported women’s rights, gay rights, and the environment
From her birth in June of 1931, Dukakis resided in Massachusetts, and acted into her 80s.
I didn’t even know who I wanted to be an actress when I was a young girl. I loved movies, but it never occurred to me to me to want to be in one.” This could have happened by chance or it could have been caused by fate. Even, even if I hadn’t made the film, I would have seen ‘Moonstruck.’ It meant that I was actually able to pay the bills that had been piling up because of that.
After the role in “Moonstruck,” Dukakis was famous.
The interesting thing about it is that people on the street shout lines from my movies at me, she said in a Los Angeles Times interview in 1991. However, according to the Urban Dictionary, “your life is ‘life is sinking like a moon.”
During “The Real L Word Landlady of the Holidays,’ ” and “The Real L.A.A. Holidays,” she played a cross-dressing real estate agent.
Others also included “Away from Her” (2006), a foul-mouthed lesbian, “Better Living” (1998), and “Never Too Late” (1996) with Cloris Leachman.
Michael, her first husband, was an actor. They were divorced in 1978, after which she raised her two sons and a daughter with Louis. She lost her husband last year. She had four great-grandchildren, four grandchildren, too.
Also Read: The Oscars 2021
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