The Moonstruck star died at the age of 89.
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Hollywood was paying tribute to Oscar-winning actress Olympia Dukakis after the actress died at the age of 89.
Dukakis died in New York City after months of failing health, her agent said. Download our mobile app for iOS or Android to get the latest breaking news and local stories.
Academy of Motion Pictures Olympia Dukakis brought warmth, humor and wit to the stage and screen for almost 60 years, including a stellar run of unforgettable roles in Steel Magnolias `Tales of the City and `Moonstruck, for which she won a Best Supporting Actress Oscar. She will be missed, the Academy of Motion Pictures tweeted Saturday.
Olympia Dukakis has died aged 89.
The family of the Oscar-winning star has confirmed she passed away in New York City after many months of failing health .
Apollo Dukakis, the actress brother, wrote on Facebook: My beloved sister, Olympia Dukakis, passed away this morning in New York City. After many months of failing health she is finally at peace and with her [husband] Louis.
The acclaimed actress won an Oscar for her role in the 1987 romantic comedy Moonstuck , and she also enjoyed enjoyed a successful career in the theatre business, both as a performer and as a director.
Olympia - who played Cher s mother in Moonstruck - also starred in Steel Magnolias , Working Girl and Look Who s Talking .
Last modified on Sun 2 May 2021 13.27 EDT
After more than two decades of distinguished work in the US theatre as an actor, director and teacher, and appearances in a dozen or so films, Olympia Dukakis, who has died aged 89, became hugely famous overnight by winning the best supporting actress Oscar in 1988 for her performance as Cher’s mother in the romantic film Moonstruck (1987).
The course of her career suggests that her ambitions never lay in the direction of Hollywood. Her theatrical credits read like the canon of classic and modern plays: she had roles in plays by Euripides, Sophocles, Shakespeare, Chekhov, Ibsen, Lorca, Pirandello, Brecht, Eugene O’Neill and Tennessee Williams, on and off Broadway, as well as in various regional theatres across the country. In films, she took on several character roles, making an impression in scores of pictures for more than half a century.
Olympia Dukakis was born on June 20, 1931, in Lowell, Mass., the older of two children of Constantine and Alexandra (Christos) Dukakis, both Greek immigrants. Her father worked in various settings, including a munitions factory, a printing business and the quality control department of Lever Brothers. He also founded an amateur theater company.
Olympia graduated from Boston University with a degree in physical therapy and practiced that occupation, traveling to West Virginia, Minnesota and Texas during the worst days of the midcentury polio epidemic. Eventually she earned enough money to return to B.U. to study theater.
The NYT also noted Olympia’s close connection to presidential politics, entwined forever with her Oscar win for her iconic role in “Moonstruck”: