Louise Fletcher

Estelle Louise Fletcher (July 22, 1934 – September 23, 2022) was an American actress. She won many awards for her television and movie acting. She is most famous for playing the main antagonist "Nurse Ratched" in the movie One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest (1975). That earned her an Academy Award for Best Actress, a BAFTA Award, and a Golden Globe Award in 1976.Gilbey, Ryan. Louise Fletcher obituary The Guardian, Sun 25 Sep 2022. She was also well known for her role as the Bajoran religious leader "Kai Winn Adami" in the television series Star Trek: Deep Space Nine (1993–99). She acted in many other movies and television series.

She was born in Birmingham, Alabama, one of the four children of a deaf couple, Robert Capers Fletcher, an Episcopal Priest and his wife, Estelle.  Rev. Fletcher worked with hearing-impaired people. Fletcher and hersibling spent a year with a hearing aunt in Texas to enable them to learn to speak. Nevertheless, Fletcher did not fully use her voice until she was eight years old. Once her schoolteacher sent her home, convinced she was deaf.The Rev. R.C. Fletcher Dies. Washington Post, March 4, 1988.

Fletcher studied dramatic arts at the University of North Carolina, then moved to Los Angeles and acted in 1950s television series. She married the producer Jerry Bick in 1960 and quit acting to raise their two sons.  Fletcher and her family moved to London in 1967. Later, in the 1970s, she tried to return to acting but at first was unsuccessful. Finally, Robert Altman persuaded her to act in his crime drama, Thieves Like Us (1974).  The film was produced by her husband, making her fear being accused of nepotism.

When Fletcher accepted her Oscar for One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest she ended her speech in sign language in recognition of  her parents' disability.  Alhough Fletcher never received a part as memorable as Nurse Ratched in later life, she continued to act throughout her life.

On September 23, 2022, Fletcher died at her home in Montdurausse, France, at the age of 88.

References

Other webbsites





Category:American movie actors
Category:American television actors
Category:Actors from Birmingham, Alabama
Category:1934 births
Category:2022 deaths