Today's Evil Beet Gossip

Anne Douglas, Wife of the Late Kirk Douglas, Dead at 102

I wouldn’t normally draw attention to the passing of a wife of a celebrity, but Anne Douglas, wife of Kirk Douglas and the stepmother of Michael Douglas, was not only an occasional actress, but she was also a consummate philanthropist and fixture in the art world.  She was 102!

Anne died at her home in Beverly Hills on Thursday, PEOPLE confirms. Her death comes just over a year after the death of her husband in February 2020. They were married for 66 years and shared two sons, Peter and Eric.

“Anne was more than a stepmother, and never ‘wicked.’ She brought out the best in all of us, especially our father. Dad would never have had the career he did without Anne’s support and partnership,” Michael, 76, said in a statement provided to PEOPLE. “Catherine [Zeta-Jones] and I and the children adored her; she will always be in our hearts.”

Anne was a film publicist and met Kirk in 1953 on the set of Act of Love in Paris after the actor had divorced from his first wife Diana (Dill) Douglas in 1951. Diana died in 2015.