Jessica Lange hints career is ‘coming to an end’

Oscar winner Jessica Lange says her acting career may be drawing to a close.

The 77-year-old actress, asked what projects she still hopes to tackle, said in an interview published Friday by Rolling Stone that the end may be near, TheWrap reported. “I actually feel like I’m coming to an end,” she said.

Ms. Lange said a couple of long-gestating projects may or may not happen, and that it no longer seems easy to get the kind of films that interest her made. She cast her most recent film, “Long Day’s Journey Into Night,” in which she plays Mary Tyrone, as a fitting final role.

The adaptation of Eugene O’Neill’s play, which also stars Ed Harris, Ben Foster and Colin Morgan, opened in theaters Sept. 25, People reported. Asked about her legacy, Ms. Lange said she wants to be remembered as an “honest actor.” She called her decades on stage and screen a joy and a great adventure, though she said balancing family and career was difficult at times.

She also said moviemaking has changed in ways she considers unwelcome. Directors once worked beside the camera, she said, but video playback has left them so far removed that actors often never see them on set.

Ms. Lange made her screen debut in the 1976 remake of “King Kong,” which earned her a Golden Globe. She has since won two Academy Awards, three Emmys and a Tony for the 2016 Broadway revival of O’Neill’s play.

Her comments follow a return to television. Ms. Lange came back to Ryan Murphy’s “American Horror Story” this year for its 13th season, reprising four of her earlier roles, which she said was the draw for returning.

It is not the first time she has talked about stepping back. In 2023, she told The Telegraph she was considering phasing out of filmmaking, Variety reported. “Creativity is secondary now to corporate profits,” she said.

Entertainment Weekly reported that Ms. Lange also said she has long wanted to make a film about Marlene Dietrich’s later career. She said it would revisit themes of aging and Hollywood’s treatment of older actresses that she explored playing Joan Crawford in FX’s “Feud: Bette and Joan,” but she has struggled to get it made.