Dame Joan Plowright, Oscar Nominee and Widow of Laurence Olivier, Dies at 95

British acting legend Dame Joan Plowright has died at 95.

The actor, who was married to fellow acting great, Lord Laurence Oliver from 1961 to his death in 1989, "died peacefully on Jan. 16, 2025 surrounded by her family,” the BBC and Sky News reported, citing a family statement.

“She enjoyed a long and illustrious career across theater, film and TV over seven decades until blindness made her retire," the family statement continued. It added that the news had been released “with great sadness.”

One of Britain’s most acclaimed and distinguished screen stars, Plowright was made a Dame by the late Queen Elizabeth in 2003. She was one of only four actresses to win two Golden Globes in one night.

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Plowright was born in Lincolnshire, England, in 1929. She began appearing in dramas as a teenager, and she won a scholarship to train at the Bristol Old Vic Theatre School. She eventually began appearing on the London stage, and was a frequent actress at the Royal Court.

In 1953, Plowright married Roger Gage. Four years later, Plowright appeared with Olivier, who was 22 years older than her, in the original production of The Entertainer. The pair fell in love. Plowright was “'touched by the bleakness in his face when he wasn't acting or flirting,” she told The Guardian in 2001. Gage filed for divorce in 1960 — the same year Olivier split from his wife, Gone with the Wind star Vivien Leigh — and he named Olivier in his divorce suit. Plowright and Olivier married in 1961.

Plowright made her film debut in 1960’s The Entertainer, the screen adaptation of the play, but for the next three decades her work focused mainly on the theater. Her stage roles — many of them at Olivier’s National Theatre — included Much Ado about Nothing, Three Sisters, Love's Labour's Lost, The Merchant of Venice, The Taming of the Shrew, The Seagull and Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?

In 1978, she won an Olivier Award (named after her husband) for her role in Filumena. She also worked on Broadway, and in 1961, she won the Tony Award for best actress in a play for A Taste of Honey. She was known for speaking her mind; a 1960 New York Times article repeatedly called her “outspoken.”

“I do not have to do anything I don’t want to do,” she told the outlet. “Some years ago, I was asked to sign a seven-year movie contract. I did not want it, because it could have kept me off the stage.”

Plowright shared three children with Olivier: Richard, born in 1961, Tamsin, born in 1963, and Julie-Kate, born in 1966. All three followed their parents into the dramatic arts, with Richard becoming a director and Tamsin and Julie-Kate working as actresses. Plowright told The Guardian of her famous husband, “I loved him so much I would have died for him, but there were times when I didn't know how to live with him.”

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Olivier died in 1989. “Larry had a huge relish for life and an enjoyment of life,” Plowright told PEOPLE in 2000. “He was over-the-top."

Plowright began to appear more often in films in the 1990s. She starred in 1991’s Enchanted April, for which she received her only Oscar nomination. She won the Golden Globe for best supporting actress for her work in the movie. At the same ceremony, she won another Globe for her role in HBO’s 1992 biopic Stalin, in which she played Stalin’s mother-in-law. She also received an Emmy nomination for the made-for-TV film.

The Guardian wrote in 2019 that Plowright had “the ability to combine down-to-earth practicality and common sense with an irrepressible joie de vivre. . . .  Looking back over her rich career is to be reminded of how much she has been a force for change in British acting.”

Other film roles included 1993’s Dennis the Menace, 1995’s The Scarlet Letter, 1996’s 101 Dalmatians and 1999’s Tea with Mussolini. Her 2000s films included Dinosaur, Bringing Down the House and The Spiderwick Chronicles. In 2001, she released a memoir, And That's Not All.

Reflecting on her less-serious movies roles — many of them in children’s films — she told the Los Angeles Times in 1996, “When you get such interesting and amusing film roles, it doesn’t seem dreadfully exciting to be in the 257th revival of [the 19th century play] The Rivals. And it’s fun setting off all over the world — and being extremely well-paid.”

Plowright suffered from macular degeneration, which impacted her vision beginning in the 2000s. She retired in 2014, after she was declared legally blind.

Plowright was named a Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire in 2004, and she was good friends with fellow Dames Maggie Smith, Judi Dench and Eileen Atkins. Together, they all appeared in 2018’s Tea with the Dames, a documentary in which they discussed their lives and careers.

Plowright reflected on her marriage to Olivier (with whom her fellow Dames had also worked) in the documentary. Of their marriage, she said, “It was momentous, earth-shattering for me . . . a very, very strange experience. . . . It was a great privilege to share in his life, as well as a bit of a nightmare.”

“She cherished her last 10 years in Sussex with constant visits from friends and family, filled with much laughter and fond memories,” the family statement continued on Friday, reported the BBC.

“We are so proud of all Joan did and who she was as a loving and deeply inclusive human being. She survived her many challenges with Plowright grit and courageous determination to make the best of them, and that she certainly did."

“Rest in peace, Joan.”

Following the announcement of her death, the Society of London Theaters said that all West End theaters in the British capital would dim their lights in tribute to Plowright at 7 p.m. on Tuesday, Jan. 21.

Plowright is survived by her children.

Read the original article on People