Oscar-winning actress and N.J. theater pioneer Olympia Dukakis dies at 89

Olympia Dukakis, a long-time theater actress who later gained movie fame for playing maternal roles, including Cher’s mother in “Moonstruck,” died on Saturday in New York City, her brother confirmed on Facebook. The former long-time Montclair resident was 89.

“My beloved sister, Olympia Dukakis, passed away this morning in New York City,” Apollo Dukakis said in the post. “After many months of failing health she is finally at peace and with her Louis.”

(Her husband, actor Louis Zorich, died in 2018.)

Born in Lowell, Mass. on June 20, 1931, Dukakis was a fencing champion in New England and attended Boston University where she majored in physical therapy and then treated polio patients before returning to the school to earn her Master of Fine Arts degree.

Dukakis began her acting career in the theater, starting in 1961 at the Williamstown Summer Theater in Massachusetts. She earned an Obie Award for Distinguished Performance for her role in the Off-Broadway play Bertolt Brecht’s “Man Equals Man.” She frequently performed at the Williamstown Summer Theater, during her last performance in 2003 she played multiple roles in “The Chekov Cycle.”

She went onto a successful film career in her fifties, performing in “Steel Magnolias,” “Mr. Holland’s Opus,” “Jane Austen’s Mafia!” and “The Thing About My Folks.”

But perhaps her most famous role was in “Moonstruck,” where she played Cher’s blunt-spoken mother. The highly-praised performance earned her a Golden Globe and an Oscar for best supporting actress, although she noted after she won that she was more intrigued by the characters she played than the awards.

After she won the Oscar, she had a run of roles playing a mother. She was Kirstie Alley’s mom in “Look Who’s Talking” and its sequel “Look Who’s Talking Too,” and the overbearing wife of Jack Lemmon (and mother of Ted Danson) in “Dad.”

But she always loyal to the theater.

In 1970, Dukakis and her husband moved to Montclair to raise their three children. Along with 10 other married theater couples, they conceived the Whole Theatre, which opened in 1973 with a presentation of “Our Town” set in a Baptist church. By 1977, the Whole Theatre had its own building in Montclair and an annual budget of $1.4 million. The theatre became known for its brazen interpretations of classics, — a modernized take on “King Lear,” infamously featured male nudity.

The theater achieved national recognition and was regarded as one of New Jersey’s signature art houses, but despite its popularity, there was constant fiscal uncertainty. The theater closed in 1990 as debts mounted.

In an interview with The Star-Ledger in 1990, Dukakis said she thought she could have turned the theater around if there was more time.

“If we’d had another two or three years, we might have done it. We’d made our identity so sharp, so clear, and we’d achieved a real uniformity of spirit. The box office had never been sweeter,” she said, adding that the loss was devastating.

“The building was difficult for me to drive by. The theater sign was still there. I couldn’t stand it, and I finally asked a friend to go and take it down,” Dukakis told The Star-Ledger. “Every time I had to go into the building there was so much feeling involved, so much cumulative loss, so much anger, so much feeling of failure.”

The legacy of the Whole Theatre lives on in Montclair, said Tom Hall, Montclair Film Festival Executive Director, in commenting on Dukakis’ impact on theater in New Jersey.

“When Olympia Dukakis and her husband Louis Zorich launched the Whole Theater Company in Montclair, they not only founded a legendary institution that produced decades of incredible work, they created a path forward for other arts organizations to thrive and prosper in Montclair. Her legacy is not only that of an award winning performer, producer, and director of stage and screen, but as a pioneer who proved that communities like Montclair could foster and support innovative, through-provoking contemporary works,” Hall said.

Dukakis and her husband moved to New York City in 1999, but she frequently returned to Montclair to visit family and friends.

One of her most recent visits to Montclair was in 2019 for the Montclair Film Festival to answer questions after a screening of the Harry Mavromichalis film “Olympia,” a documentary that told the story of the veteran actress.

“I was proud to welcome Olympia back to Montclair, to the 2019 Montclair Film Festival, to share OLYMPIA, the documentary portrait of her life. It was wonderful to be able to meet her and hear her wonderful stories about art, life, love, and loss,” Hall tweeted.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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Jeremy Schneider may be reached at jschneider@njadvancemedia.com. Tell us your coronavirus story or send a tip here.