"Right before we left, my mom came downstairs ready to go, but she was dressed in a long, formal, red evening gown that she had planned to wear to a gala another night. "One day my mom couldn't find her passport, even though she had put it in her pocket just a few minutes before." Another time, her mother was accompanying Harden to an informal press event, and they had discussed what they were going to wear several times. The signs of encroaching disease were subtle, Harden remembers. GETTY IMAGES/BRUCE GLIKAS/FILMMAGIC Subtle Signs Marcia Gay Harden with her mother, Beverly, at the 2009 Tony Awards. Years later, as Harden raised her own three children, Beverly, whose husband died in 2002, became a doting grandmother. "There are so many decisions to make on behalf of another person." She and her siblings have had to determine where their mother should live, what sort of care she should have, and how much intervention she might want in her last days, says Harden.įor most of her life, Harden's mother was a spirited Navy wife who raised five children, often by herself, while her husband was at sea. "It's very much a disease that impacts the entire family," Harden says. As the irreversible, progressive brain disorder slowly destroyed her mother's memory and thinking skills, Harden found herself becoming her mother's caregiver and parent. Yet Harden admits she was unprepared for the role she assumed after her mother, Beverly, was diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease in 2009 at age 72. She can assume any role and deliver an award-worthy performance. Throughout her career, Harden has proved her versatility.
#MARCIA GAY HARDEN YOUNGER YEARS CODE#
Today, she plays the brilliant emergency room doctor Leanne Rorish on the CBS medical drama, Code Black. Nine years later she snagged a Tony for her role in the Broadway hit God of Carnage. In 2000, she won an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress as Lee Krasner, in Pollock, a biopic about the painter Jackson Pollock. In 1990, Marcia Gay Harden made her big screen debut as Verna Bernbaum in the Coen brothers' black comedy Miller's Crossing. Actress Marcia Gay Harden Becomes Alzheimer’s Advocate After Mother’s Diagnosis