6 decades

It's a very poorly phrased sentence. I take it to mean that she had 6 decades of acting experience.

In one of her most famous roles, the 1972 film The Poseidon Adventure, Shelley Winters combined her character-acting from 6 decades of film, with guts and compassion? Or something along those lines....it doesn't work all that well as a single sentence. How do you combine acting skills with guts and compassion - I thought those were already part of acting?