Oscar winner Brenda Fricker, known for ‘My Left Foot’ and ‘Home Alone 2,’ dead at 81

Digital Editor

Oscar-winning actress Brenda Fricker, known for her roles in “My Left Foot” and “Home Alone 2,” has died, according to numerous reports.

She was 81. A cause of death has not been immediately revealed.

The Dublin-born actress was the first Irish woman to win an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress, playing Daniel Day-Lewis’ on-screen mother Bridget Fagan Brown in “My Left Foot.”

Related video above | Remembering those we lost in 2026

She also was widely recognized for her portrayal of the “pigeon lady” in the 1992 holiday classic “Home Alone 2: Lost in New York,” who forms an unlikely friendship with Kevin McCallister.

Over a career spanning more than six decades, Fricker appeared in other notable films including “The Field,” “So I Married an Axe Murderer,” “Angels in the Outfield,” “A Time to Kill,” “Veronica Guerin” and “Albert Nobbs.”

Television audiences knew her for portraying nurse Megan Roach on the BBC series “Casualty.”

“We will never see her like again and the world is lesser for the lack of her,” her agent Phill Belfield said in part. “I was honored to know, love and work with her and she will always have a place in my heart and in the heart of so many film and TV fans the world over.”