‘I had to lie to my mother and tell her…’ Basic Instinct star Sharon Stone recalls her mother’s last days and why she decided to ‘ignore’ her on her deathbed

The last thing Sharon Stone told her mother was a white lie. Not to save face or prevent a conflict, but to give her a moment of peace before her death. In an emotional interview with Anderson Cooper, the Basic Instinct star said that, like any other daughter, she hoped that her mother would tell her she loved her and was proud of her on her deathbed, but it was not to be. Still, that didn’t stop the star from doing her duty – telling a lie to make a dying woman’s last moments free from anguish. The actress recalled her mother’s last days, saying that her mother often behaved as if she didn’t like her at all.

A Life Shaped By Trauma

Recalling her mother Dorothy Marie’s eventful life, the King Solomon’s Mines star said that she had a difficult childhood and left her home when she was nine because she was suffering violent abuse. She passed away in her house, and Stone was taking care of her. “She was terrified to die because she was afraid her parents would be there,” the actress reminisced.

'Determined to make her final moments peaceful,' Stone revealed. “I had to lie to her. I told her that her father was in jail and her mother was in a mental hospital, and they weren’t going to be there. The night that she was dying, she was really fighting it…”


Though grief-stricken, Stone eventually realised she had to let her mother pass in peace as she watched her struggle between life and death, desperate to cling to it amid the doctors administering morphine doses. “I realised, I needed to stop walking in the room, go upstairs and ignore my mother, so she would die. I needed to detach and release,” she said. The actress also admitted that it was hard for her to come to that decision, as she was expecting a tearful goodbye and some last loving words from her mother. “I wanted to hear words such as ‘I love you, I am proud of you, you’re important to me’… 'I wasn't going to get them,” she said, getting tearful. “I had to make peace; I had to release her,” she added.

“Sometimes, the person that the person is meanest to, you find out is the person they’re most attached to because they feel safest to take it out on you,” she concluded.

The actress shares her mother’s demise in July 2025. Dorothy was an accountant.

Stone is a veteran actress. She rose to fame playing femme fatales in films such as Basic Instinct and Casino. She was one of the most popular sex symbols in the 1990s. She is also a recipient of accolades such as a Primetime Emmy Award, a Golden Globe Award, and a nomination for an Academy Award.