Lorna Raver, who played Mrs Ganush in Sam Raimi’s hit horror Drag Me to Hell, has died at the age of 81.
According to the Hollywood Reporter, her death was included in the “in memoriam” section of the Screen Actors Guild’s summer magazine. She died in May.
Raver is best known for playing the woman who curses Alison Lohman’s bank teller in Drag Me to Hell, Raimi’s 2009 horror movie. The film premiered at Cannes and made more than $90m at the global box office.
“We just wanted to tell the story of a person who wants to be a good person but who makes a sinful choice out of greed, for their own benefit, and pays the price for it,” Raimi said upon its premiere.
It received positive reviews from critics, many of whom praised Raver’s performance. In her review for the New York Times, Jeannette Catsoulis called Raver “gleefully disgusting” while Variety’s Peter Debruge referred to her as a “memorable” villain.
“It was a lot of fun,” Raver said in an interview at the time. “I mean it was gruelling sometimes but it was a lot of fun and Sam is terrific to work with … I was a little apprehensive going into it but I had a wonderful time.”
Raver’s film roles also included the dark 1996 comedy Freeway alongside Reese Witherspoon, the Matt Dillon-led crime thriller Armored and supernatural horror The Caller.
On TV, she was best known for soap The Young and the Restless, where she appeared on 26 episodes. She also had roles in NYPD Blue, Bones, One Tree Hill, Weeds, Nip/Tuck, Star Trek: Voyager and Grey’s Anatomy.
She also appeared in many off-Broadway productions and was a prolific audiobook narrator.
“I can’t say exactly why I wanted to become an actor – the yen was just always there,” Raver said in a 2011 interview. “It was only after I became an actor that I learned what I love about it: I love the chance to live multiple lives and I’m stimulated by the work of developing the discipline, skill and openness one needs in order to inhabit those other lives.”
She retired from acting in 2014.
“I always had this idea that women of a certain age just shouldn’t even bother to try and make it in Hollywood, and I have been pleasantly surprised and blessed by all the work that has come my way,” she said in 2009.
