Get the latest gossip

‘The Notebook’ Star Gena Rowlands Has Alzheimer’s, Just Like Her Character

Gena Rowlands is living with Alzheimer’s disease, an ironic turn of events considering her most memorable movie character suffered the same.

James Garner, Sam Shepard, director Nick Cassavetes and actress Gena Rowlands pose at the premiere of New Lines’ “The Notebook” at the Village Theatre on June 21, 2004 in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by Kevin Winter/Getty Images) Gena Rowlands’ son Nick Cassavetes shared the news of his mother’s condition in a new interview with Entertainment Weekly. “This last one — ‘The Notebook,’ based on the novel by Nicholas Sparks — was particularly hard because I play a character who has Alzheimer’s,” Rowlands told the publication at the time.

Get the Android app