Marisa Paredes, a grand dame of Spanish cinema, died of heart failure in Madrid on Tuesday. She was 78.

While she appeared in 75 films, she will be best remembered for the five films in which she starred, directed by Pedro Almodóvar: “Dark Habits” (1983), “High Heels” (1991), “The Flower of My Secret” (1995). , “All About My Mother” (1999) and “The Skin I Live In” (2011). She believed she delivered one of her best performances of her career with The Flower of My Secret, which marked the beginning of Almodóvar’s return to his roots and his mother’s world, a reconnection that continues to this day.

More of diversity

In The Flower of My Secret, Paredes played a chic romantic novelist who initially seemed like a fish out of water in the village where she was born.

In real life, Paredes had a natural elegance, enhanced by her fondness for dresses by the Spain-based designer Sybille, which, as JA Bayona noted in response to her death, gave her “an aura of myth.” Still, he added, “She was kind, sensitive and always attentive.”

Paredes was born the daughter of a janitor in impoverished post-war Spain in the working-class Plaza de Santa Ana in central Madrid. She appeared briefly in a masterpiece by Fernando Fernán Gómez, El Mundo Sigue (1965), but really made a name for herself in classic plays such as Chekhov, Dostoyevsky and Ibsen, which were televised by public broadcaster RTVE.

She then starred with Spain’s classic modern directors, beginning with Fernando Trueba in his 1980 debut Opera Prima, in a role that gave her the impression of a grand dame and demonstrated her sense of humor. Leading roles later followed, especially in Agustí Villaronga’s “In a Glass Cage” (1986), but also in “Deep Crimson” (1996) and “No One Writes to the Colonel” (1999) by the Mexican Arturo Ripstein and in Guillermo del Toros “The Devil’s Backbone” (2001).

Despite her glamorous charisma, she never forgot her own origins. She was elected president of the Spanish Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and took to the stage at the 2003 Goya Awards to support the protests of several winners for supporting the invasion of Iraq by the right-wing government of José María Aznar.

Paredes is survived by her partner of decades Chema Prado, a former director of Filmoteca Española, and her daughter María Isasi.

The best of diversity

Sign up for Variety’s newsletter. For the latest news, follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.