Karen Black, the actress who played key roles in the New Hollywood movement of the late 1960s and early 1970s, has died at age 74 following a battle with cancer.
Black’s husband, Stephen Eckelberry, told friends and family of the news on his Facebook page, notes The Hollywood Reporter. “It is with great sadness that I have to report that my wife and best friend, Karen Black has just passed away, only a few minutes ago,” Eckelberry wrote. “Thank you all for all your prayers and love, they meant so much to her as they did to me.”
In November 2010, Black was diagnosed with ampullary cancer and had a third of her pancreas removed. Her husband said in March that she was “mostly bed-ridden” and weighed only 96 pounds. TheWrap notes that the couple tried crowd-sourcing to raise money for treatment at a clinic in Europe.
Black played important parts for the new generation of Hollywood filmmakers in the 1960s and 1970s. Although she had been acting throughout the decade, it wasn’t until 1969’s Easy Rider, in which she had a small role, that her fame skyrocketed.
She then went on to play Jack Nicholson’s girlfriend in 1970’s Five Easy Pieces, one of the most acclaimed films of the era. She earned her only Oscar nomination for her supporting role in the film. She would go on to work with Robert Altman in Nashville and then in Alfred Hitchcock’s last film, Family Plot.
Black never stopped working and made appearances in low-budget fare like 2005’s My Suicidal Sweetheart in 2005 and 2002’s Curse of the Forty-Niner.
If you need a refresher of her fantastic performance in Five Easy Pieces, check out this clip:
image: Wikipedia Commons
