Melinda Dillon obit

Melinda Dillon, Actress in ‘Close Encounters of the Third Kind’ and ‘A Christmas Story,’ Dies at 83

A two-time Oscar nominee, she also appeared in 'Bound for Glory,' 'Slap Shot' and on Broadway in 'Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?'

 

She was not on the list.

Melinda Dillon, who received supporting Oscar nominations for her turns in Close Encounters of the Third Kind and Absence of Malice and portrayed the doting mom in the holiday perennial A Christmas Story, died Jan. 9, her family announced. She was 83.

Right out of the gate, Dillon earned a Tony nomination and Theatre World award in 1963 for her debut performance on Broadway as the childlike wife Honey in the original production of Edward Albee‘s Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?

Later, the Arkansas native played two characters opposite David Carradine — Woody Guthrie’s first wife, Mary, and a dark-haired folk singer named Memphis Sue — in the biopic Bound for Glory (1976), directed by Hal Ashby; was a lesbian hockey wife in George Roy Hill’s Slap Shot (1977); and portrayed John Lithgow’s wife in the family film Harry and the Hendersons (1987).

Her big-screen résumé also included Norman Jewison’s F.I.S.T. (1978), as the girlfriend/wife of a Teamster played by Sylvester Stallone; Barbra Streisand’s The Prince of Tides (1991), as the suicidal sister of Nick Nolte’s character; and Paul Thomas Anderson’s Magnolia (1999), as the wife of a philandering quiz show host (Philip Baker Hall).

She was married to late actor Richard Libertini from 1963 until their 1978 divorce, and they had a son.

In Steven Spielberg’s Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977), Dillon portrayed Jillian Guiler, the single mother who heads to Devils Tower with utility worker Roy Neary (Richard Dreyfuss) in search of her 3-year-old son, who’s been abducted by aliens through the kitchen doggy door.

Ashby had recommended her to Spielberg for the part, and she was hired just days before filming began.

Sydney Pollack’s Absence of Malice (1981) had her back with Slap Shot co-star Paul Newman, this time playing a Catholic woman who takes her own life after a reporter (Sally Field) writes a story about her abortion.

At the Oscars, Dillon lost out to Vanessa Redgrave of Julia in 1978 and to Maureen Stapleton of Reds in 1982.

Still, unlike those two, Dillon shows up every holiday season on TV rebroadcasts as the sweet mother of Ralphie (Peter Billingsley) and Randy (Ian Petrella) and wife of Darren McGavin’s Old Man Parker in A Christmas Story (1983), directed by Bob Clark.

In the film, Sam Kashner noted in a 2016 article for Vanity Fair, “Dillon has a sweetly comedic presence that threatens to dissolve into creative anarchy. She’s a vigilant mom but is still a child at heart, apparent when she encourages her youngest, Randy, a fussy eater, to pretend he’s a pig at a trough. Randy really gets into it, snorting and plunging his face into his meat loaf and mashed potatoes, while he and his mom dissolve into fits of laughter.”

As The New York Times pointed out, the poor woman “hadn’t had a hot meal for herself in 15 years.”

Melinda Ruth Dillon was born on Oct. 13, 1939, in Hope, Arkansas. Her mother divorced and remarried an Army veteran, and she lived on several military bases, including one in Nuremberg, Germany, before graduating from high school in Chicago.

While working as the coat check girl for The Second City, she stepped in for an ill Barbara Harris and performed in a skit, setting her acting career in motion. (Second City also is where she met Libertini, who was a member of the improvisational comedy troupe.) After studying acting at DePaul University, she came to New York and was cast opposite Uta Hagen, Arthur Hill and George Grizzard in Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? However, she left the intense play after nine months and spent time in a psychiatric hospital.

“I was in Virginia Woolf, and I just went crazy; it was really that simple,” she said in a 1976 interview with The New York Times.

“I think it was the way I was living; the play was so long and the actors’ union wouldn’t let us play the matinee. We had to have a whole different cast for that, but I was called in to do it many, many times because the gal would get sick. I would do it three hours in the afternoon, then study with Lee Strasberg for two hours, and do the play three hours at night. Then, George Grizzard left to do Hamlet, and a strange thing happened. I had learned to lean on George hard, and I just crumbled inside. I don’t know why.

“I had had the American dream — to go to New York and study with Lee Strasberg. I guess I just wasn’t prepared for it all to happen so quickly in New York. I’m not sophisticated; I hadn’t had any kind of cultural education, at all, so when it came to meeting people, and presenting any kind of ideas I might have to offer, I would be terrified.”

Meanwhile, Sandy Dennis went on to play Honey in Mike Nichols’ 1966 film version of Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? and won an Oscar.

Dillon returned to Broadway in 1967, spending two seasons in the hit You Know I Can’t Hear You When the Water’s Running, and in 1970 for a Second City reunion via Paul Sills’ Story Theatre. In between, she made her big-screen debut in The April Fools (1969), starring Jack Lemmon.

Dillon went on to appear in other films including The Muppet Movie (1979), Songwriter (1984), Sioux City (1994), To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything, Julie Newmar (1995), How to Make an American Quilt (1995) and Reign Over Me (2007). She also guest-starred on such TV shows as The Jeffersons, Picket Fences and Heartland.

Filmography

Film

Year       Title       Role       Notes

1959      The Cry of Jazz   Faye       short film

1969      The April Fools Leslie Hopkins   

1976      Bound for Glory                Mary     Nominated—Golden Globe Award for New Star of the Year – Actress

1977      Slap Shot             Suzanne Hanrahan          

1977      Close Encounters of the Third Kind           Jillian Guiler        Nominated—Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress

Nominated—Saturn Award for Best Actress

1978      F.I.S.T.   Anna Zarinkas   

1979      The Muppet Movie         Woman with Balloon      Uncredited

1981      Absence of Malice           Teresa   Kansas City Film Critics Circle Award for Best Supporting Actress

Nominated—Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress

Nominated—Los Angeles Film Critics Association Award for Best Supporting Actress

1983      A Christmas Story             Mother Parker  

1984      Songwriter          Honey Carder    

1987      Harry and the Hendersons           Nancy Henderson            Nominated—Saturn Award for Best Actress

1988      Shattered Innocence      Sharon Anderson            

1989      Staying Together              Eileen McDermott          

1990      Spontaneous Combustion            Nina      

1990      Captain America               Mrs. Rogers       

1991      The Prince of Tides          Savannah Wingo              

1994      Sioux City             Leah Goldman  

1995      To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything! Julie Newmar          Merna  

1995      How to Make an American Quilt                Mrs. Darling       

1996      Entertaining Angels: The Dorothy Day Story          Sister Aloysius  

1999      Magnolia             Rose Gator          Florida Film Critics Circle Award for Best Cast

Nominated—Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Motion Picture

2001      Cowboy Up         Rose Braxton     

2004      Debating Robert Lee       Mrs. Lee              

2005      Adam & Steve   Dottie  

2007      Reign Over Me Ginger Timpleman          

Television

Year       Title       Role       Notes

1963      The Defenders Jeannie Birch      Episode: "The Empty Heart"

1964      East Side/West Side        Stacey Barbella Episode: "The Beatnik and the Policeman"

1969      Bonanza               Cissy Summers Episode: "A Lawman's Lot Is Not a Happy One"

1970      Storefront Lawyers aka Men at Law          Connie Swann    Episode: "He Lies Better Than I Tell the Truth"

1975      The Jeffersons   Daphne                Episode: "Harry and Daphne"

1976      Sara       Lily Henchard     Episode: "Lady"

1976      Freeman              Madam Arkadina              Television pilot

1977      Enigma Dora Herren       Television movie

1978      The Critical List Kris Lassiter        Miniseries

1979      Transplant           Anne Hurley       Television movie

1979      CHiPs     Unknown            Episode: "Death Watch"

1980      Marriage Is Alive and Well            Jeannie                 Television movie

1980      The Shadow Box               Agnes    Television movie

1981      Fallen Angel        Sherry Phillips    Television movie

1981      Insight   Janet     Episode: "A Decision to Love"

1981      Insight   Mysterious Woman         Episode: "Rendezvous"

1982      Insight   Susie      Episode: "The Fiddler"

1982      The Juggler of Notre Dame           Dulcy     Television movie

1983      The Mississippi Unknown            Episode: "Cradle to Grave"

1983      Right of Way      Ruda Dwyer        Television movie

1984      Insight   Woman                Episode: "The Game Room"

1985      The Twilight Zone             Penny   Episode: "A Little Peace and Quiet"

1985      Space    Rachel Mott        Television movie

1986      Shattered Spirits               Joyce Mollencamp           Television movie

1988      Shattered Innocence      Sharon Anderson             Television movie

1989      Nightbreaker     Paula Brown       Television movie

1993      Judgment Day: The John List Story            Elanor List           Television movie

1994      State of Emergency         Betty Anderson                 Television movie

Nominated—CableACE Award for Best Supporting Actress in a Miniseries or a Movie

1995      The Client            Verna Caldwell Episode: "The Peach Orchard"

1995      Naomi & Wynonna: Love Can Build a Bridge         Polly Judd            Television movie

1996      Picket Fences     Mrs. Klausner     Episode: "Liver Let Die"

1997      Tracey Takes On...            Desiree                 Episode: "Mothers"

2001      Judging Amy       Violet Loomis     Episode: "Surprised by Gravity"

2003      The Lyon's Den Charlotte Barrington       Episode: "Pilot"

2003      A Painted House               Gran Chandler   Television movie

2005      Law & Order: Special Victims Unit             Jenny Rogers      Episode: "Blood"

2007      Heartland            Janet Jacobs       3 episodes