Lorna Thayer

Character actress Lorna Thayer will probably remain in good standing in the Hollywood cult movie annals for decades to come, due to one scene and one scene, alone. In the critically-acclaimed "generation gap" film, Five Easy Pieces (1970), Jack Nicholson plays a rebellious, disgruntled musician-cum-oil rigger with "loose cannon" tendencies who takes his frustrations out on an uncooperative roadside hash-slinger, played by Lorna, who refuses to allow him food substitutes while ordering a meal. This memorable movie vignette, now referred to as the "chicken salad sandwich-scene," has tended to overshadow all of Lorna's other productive work on stage, TV and film. Born Lorna Patricia Casey in Boston on March 10, 1919, her mother, actress Louise Gibney, brought the family to California in 1923 to escape the cold winters and settled in Venice Beach, eventually securing a permanent residence in Hollywood. From 1952, Lorna could be glimpsed here and there in a handful of humorless working-class bits in such films as The Lusty Men (1952), Women's Prison (1955), The Beast with a Million Eyes (1955), I Want to Live! (1958) and Freckles (1960). She appeared on both the New York and Los Angeles stages and made her Broadway debut in "Comes a Day" in 1958, returning six years later with a role in "Never Live Over a Pretzel Factory". A fairly steady TV fixture throughout the 1950s and 1960s, she experienced a slump for a time until her celebrated bit with Nicholson triggered a host of character film work, including Cisco Pike (1971), The Dion Brothers (1974), Buddy Buddy (1981) and Nothing in Common (1986), along with assorted TV mini-movies. Although it did not improved her standing all that much, she made do and had a bit part in the Al Pacino/Michelle Pfeiffer starrer, Frankie and Johnny (1991), before retiring. Lorna was married twice--to actor George N. Neise (divorced) and Arthur Dowling (widowed). She had two daughters, Adrienne and Nikki. Lorna was diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease five years before her death in 2005 at age 85. At the time, she was living at the Motion Picture and Television Fund retirement establishment in Woodland Hills, California.