I Had No Idea This Actress Had Passed, Until I Saw The Photograph Below!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

                                                                              

                           I knew Sixties folk/rock singer Melanie Safka had passed years before, but when I saw the first photograph, I thought it was her.  

                            To my sadness and surprise, I found out the person was hard working character actress Mariclaire Costello.  Not much had been heard from her, so I thought she had already passed.  But God bless her, she made it to 90.

                              I had known her for three things, one of which was very important.

                             The first was the family drama, "The Fitzpatricks," which featured Kristy McNichol's brother, Jimmy, and a very young Helen Hunt, who looked snippy and mean girl-ish even then.   It ran from 1977 to 1978.

                              The second was a moment in the 1980 Oscar winning drama "Ordinary People."  It takes place on a golf course, where Beth (the villain, played by Mary Tyler Moore) abandons her family and visits her brother.  She has a meltdown and says "I don't know what anyone wants from me, anymore." To which Mariclaire answers, comfortingly "Beth, no one wants anything from you."  Her reading was spot on, but because of the opinion I hold of Beth I always found this line double-edged, and it still makes me laugh.

                                 Had none of the above happened, Mariclaire Costello would have been remembered for one thing alone.  She became an icon in the 1971 horror film, "Let's Scare Jessica To Death," starring Zohra Lampert.  Once the moment is seen where she rises out of the lake, like a water ghost /vampire, and walks to land, where she menaces Lampert.  The moment is seared into the viewer's head.  You have to see it for yourselves, girls, which is why I just had to include it in the post covering her passing.

                                 I urge you to watch the film or find this moment on YouTube.

                                Mariclaire Costello did many things, but this is how I will remember her.

                                  Rest In Peace, Mariclaire.  You may not have known at the time, but you made an important contribution to horror film history.

                                    As one of my friends says, "May your memory be a blessing.'