Melinda Dillon, who starred in “Close Encounters of the Third Kind” and “A Christmas Story,” has died. He was 83 years old.
As the news first hit headlines Friday, an obituary page for a cremation provider in Long Beach, Calif., said Dillon died Jan. 9. The two-time Oscar nominee’s cause of death has not been made public, but the reasons for celebrating his life have long been clear.
Dillon was born Oct. 13, 1939, in Hope, Arkansas, and began acting at the Goodman Theater in Chicago, according to a biography from Turner Classic Movies. He was an original member of The Second City, the renowned improv center for emerging talent such as Tina Fey, Steve Carell and Chris Farley.
However, Dillon cut his dramatic teeth on Broadway and studied under legends such as Uta Hagen and Lee Strasberg.
She was nominated for a Tony Award in 1962 after starring in the original cast of Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? and performed 1967’s “You Know I Can’t Hear You When the Water’s Running,” per People.
“I had the American dream: to go to New York and study with Lee Strasberg,” Dillon told The New York Times in 1976. “I guess I’m not ready for everything to happen so quickly in New York. I’m not sophisticated.”
Michael Ochs Archives via Getty Images
After landing small roles on daytime television shows such as Bonanza and The Jeffersons, Dillon broke into Hollywood with roles in Hal Ashby’s Bound for Glory (1976) and opposite Paul Newman in “Slapshot” (1976). ) by George Roy Hill. ).
At Ashby’s suggestion, Steven Spielberg cast Dillon in his sci-fi classic “Close Encounters,” according to The Hollywood Reporter. Dillon, who was cast three days before filming, received an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress.
Dillon has become a mainstay on coveted casting agent lists for decades.
She starred in ‘FIST’ (1978) opposite Sylvester Stallone, played John Lithgow’s wife in ‘Harry and the Hendersons’ (1987) and appeared in ‘Prince of Tides’ (1991) opposite Nick Nolte, directed by Barbra Streisand.
“Melinda Dillon was a great actress with a wonderful delicacy about her.” Streisand tweeted on Friday. “Prince of Tides was a pleasure to direct. Rest in peace.”
Dillon earned her second Oscar nomination for Absence of Malice (1981), a legal thriller directed by Sydney Pollack that reunited her with Newman. Her role as Mother Parker in Bob Clark’s A Christmas Story (1983) is fondly remembered to this day.
Sunset Boulevard via Getty Images
“So very, very sad to hear of the passing of Melinda Dillon,” actor Lou Diamond Phillips tweeted. “She played my adoptive mother in Sioux City, my second directorial effort. What a light and blessing. So effortless about her work that it was easy to overlook how brilliant she was.”
“I feel so lucky to have known her,” Phillips continued. “RIP.”
Other notable credits include “The Muppet Movie” (1979), “To Wong Foo” (1995), “Magnolia” (1999) and “Reign Over Me” (2007). Married to the late Second City graduate Richard Libertini from 1963 to 1978, Dillon is survived by one child.
Many of Dillon’s colleagues, friends and colleagues are now paying tribute to him online.
