Celebrity Deaths

‘Julie & Julia' Author Julie Powell Dead at 49

Powell was played by Amy Adams on the big screen

Gregg DeGuire/FilmMagic

Julie Powell, the food blogger played by Amy Adams in the film "Julie & Julia," died at age 49 in her New York residence Oct. 26, per The New York Times. According to her husband, Eric Powell, Julie's cause of death was cardiac arrest.

Her passing comes about 20 years after Julie Powell changed the trajectory of her life — and arguably the trajectory of food blogging — back in 2002 when she decided to set off on a mission to cook all 524 recipes listed in Julia Child's book "Mastering the Art of French Cooking, Volume 1." Powell documented this experiment in her blog "The Julie/Julia Project"—but that was just the beginning.

Powell eventually turned her blog into the book "Julie & Julia: 365 Days, 524 Recipes, 1 Tiny Apartment Kitchen," which was published in 2005. And in 2009, the book was adapted into "Julie & Julia," a film written and directed by Nora Ephron which co-starred Meryl Streep as Child. The movie intertwined the stories of both Powell's and Child's culinary experience.

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At the time, Powell reflected on how she differed from the way Adams portrayed her onscreen, noting that some aspects are the same and teasing that others are quite different.

Meryl Streep sits down to talk about becoming Julia Child for the movie “Julie & Julia.”

"The marriage scenes between her and Chris Messina, who plays my husband, feel really authentic, very much the way we talk to one another and just ARE together," Julie told Orlando Sentinel in 2009. "She's much nicer than me, of course. Read the book after seeing the movie and you will be shocked. She plays these sweet roles and I, to say the least, am not sweet!"

Powell added, "I'm a complainer. But now, with my life these days, I have nothing to complain about!"

Now after her death, fans are remembering Powell for the life she led.

One user penned to Twitter, "I so admired her open-hearted honesty as a writer and a person. She was a vibrant presence here and everywhere. A great loss."

Meanwhile another added, "This hits me hard--J&J was a major influence in my decision to work in food, in part because Julie Powell was so effective at writing about cooking as a means of intellectual engagement and personal fulfillment. She was a splendid writer and lost far too soon."

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