Everyone will always be Mildred Ratched,
the grim, callous head nurse
of the Salem psychiatric hospital in 'One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest',
Milos Forman's cult film from 1975
, based on the novel by Ken Kasey, for over 112 years. millions of dollars grossed in the world, six Golden Globes and five Oscars.
The statuette for best leading actress went to Louise Fletcher, who died today in France, in Montdurasse, where she lived, at the age of 88.
The role of the nurse was written for Ellen Burstyn who had to refuse to assist her husband, who was also hospitalized in a psychiatric hospital.
Fletcher agreed at the last moment, giving the cruel Mildred an extraordinary interpretive mimesis alongside
an unsurpassed Jack Nicholson
as the hooligan Patrick McMurphy, who fakes madness to avoid jail, descending the infernal rings of repressive therapy to electroshock and lobotomy.
An iconic character to the point that Netflix in 2020 created the 'Ratched' series (directed by Ryan Murphy, starring Sarah Paulson) dedicated to the story of the nurse.
"You hated me so much that you finally decided to reward me with this statuette. I can only say that I was delighted to
receive first so much hate and now so much love
," said the actress receiving the Academy award in 1976. He then used sign language to thank deaf parents for their support.
In over sixty years of career he has collected
various roles in cinema and on TV
.
He starred in 'Exorcist II: The Heretic' (1977), 'The Cheap Detective' (1978), 'The Lady in Red' (1979), 'Brainstorm' (1983), 'Uncontrollable Paranormal Phenomena' (1984) ), 'Flowers in the Attic' (1987) 'Blue Steel' (1990) and 'Cruel Intentions' (1999).
Born in 1934 in Birmingham, Alabama, in 1959 Louise Fletcher married film producer Jerry Bick, with whom she had two children, then divorced in 1977. She had a recurring role in 'Star Trek: Deep Space Nine' and was Multiple Emmy nominations for guest-star roles on 'The Brock Family' in 1996 and 'Joan of Arcadia' in 2004. Her most recent appearances on Netflix's 'Shamaless' and 'Girlboss'.