Anne Buydens Douglas, German-American producer and widow of actor Kirk Douglas, died on Thursday at the age of 102, according to the Douglas family.
“It is with great sadness that the Douglas family announces the passing of their matriarch, Anne Douglas, peacefully at home in Beverly Hills this afternoon at age 102,” the estate announced.
Douglas met her famous husband in 1953 of the set of the film Act of Love. He offered her a job as his publicist, which she turned down in perfect English. He then invited her to dinner and she declined again, choosing instead to eat scrambled eggs at home. Kirk Douglas then tried once again to convince her to be his publicist, which started the pair’s working relationship.
“With no romance in the picture, I stopped trying to impress Anne,” Kirk wrote in their 2017 book, Kirk and Anne: Letters of Love, Laughter, and a Lifetime in Hollywood. “Instead, I stopped talking about myself and began to listen to her.”
The actor proposed to Douglas a year later. They flew to Las Vegas in the afternoon on May 29, 1954 and got married. They did not have a fancy wedding, but Kirk promised Douglas he would make it up to her. They had a big wedding for their 50th anniversary in 2004.
She was born in Germany to a successful businessman and went to school in Switzerland. She eventually had to flee the Nazis and move to Paris before eventually moving to the United States.
Douglas’ death comes a little over a year after her husband passed away. The couple was married for 66 years and had two sons together, Peter Douglas and the late Eric Douglas. Douglas also had two step-sons, Michael Douglas and Joel Douglas, whose mother is the late Diana Dill.
Michael paid tribute to his step-mother, expressing what she meant to him, his wife, Catherine Zeta-Jones, and their children.
“Anne was more than a stepmother, and never ‘wicked.’ She brought out the best in all of us, especially our father,” he said in a statement. “Dad would never have had the career he did without Anne’s support and partnership. Catherine and I and the children adored her; she will always be in our hearts.”
