R.I.P. Natasha Richardson

My children are used to me exclaiming over the death of a celebrity whose name they don't recognize. I've been doing it a lot lately. But Natasha Richardson they knew as the mother in the remake of The Parent Trap with Lindsay Lohan.

And they know Liam Neeson as Obi Wan's mentor in The Phantom Menace.

To me, Ms. Richardson was one of those classic English beauties: blond, calm, self-possessed when needed, fiery and passionate inside. She seemed to have a graciousness onscreen. I remember he performance in Nell and in A Handmaid's Tale, though I didn't realize that she played "aFrank" until I read her obituary. The idea that she died from fall on the bunny slope seems preposterous. She didn't slam into a tree, as Sonny Bono did. She wasn't doing anything particularly daring or dangerous.

She was on holiday with her family.

May she rest in peace and may her husband and sons find comfort in her memory.