Shelley Duvall, Terrified Mom in The Shining, Dead at 75

Beyond Kubrick’s horror, the unforgettable actor starred in seven Robert Altman films.

Shelley Duvall, known for her roles as the terrified wife in The Shining and in a number of Robert Altman films, is dead at 75. The actor died in her sleep of complications from diabetes at her Blanco, Texas, home, her partner, Dan Gilroy, told The Hollywood Reporter. “My dear, sweet, wonderful life partner and friend left us,” Gilroy said. “Too much suffering lately, now she’s free. Fly away, beautiful Shelley.” Duvall began her career after director Robert Altman scouted her while she was attending a junior college in her home state, Texas. Her film debut came in 1970 with the Altman-directed Brewster McCloud. Throughout the next decade, she continued to star in six more films by the New Hollywood auteur, including McCabe & Mrs. Miller (1971), Thieves Like Us (1974), Buffalo Bill and the Indians, or Sitting Bull’s History Lesson (1976), and 3 Women (1977). Duvall earned a Best Actress award at Cannes for her starring turn in the psychological thriller 3 Women, playing an attendant at an elderly health spa.

Her most famous role, and perhaps most difficult shoot, came with The Shining, where audiences stared into her large, horrified eyes as her husband, played by Jack Nicholson, came swinging with an ax. Just before she left Hollywood in the mid-’90s, she set up her own production company, Think Entertainment, which produced lovely and bizarre children’s programming. She swung back to acting after two decades away in 2023, starring in The Forest Hills, her last film. Her voice became a trend on on the internet over the past few years, thanks to a fan edit of her Faerie Tale Theatre introduction, “Hello, I’m Shelley Duvall.”

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