Shelley Duvall
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“The Shining” actor Shelley Duvall died Thursday at her home in Blanco, Texas, her partner Dan Gilroy said. She was 75.
Gilroy said Duvall had been in hospice and bedridden for the last few months due to complications from diabetes. She died in her sleep, he said in a phone call.
“She’s gone after much suffering,” said Gilroy, her life partner since 1989. “I can’t tell you how much I miss her.”
Duvall is best known for her roles in the 1980 horror movie classic “The Shining” with Jack Nicholson and the 1980 comedy “Popeye” with Robin Williams. Known for working with film director and screenwriter Robert Altman, her first screen role was in Altman’s 1970 comedy “Brewster McCloud,” Variety reported.
Shelley Duvall and Jack Nicholson circa 1980 in New York City.
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Other works included “McCabe & Mrs. Miller,” “Thieves Like Us,” “Nashville,” “Buffalo Bill and the Indians” and “Annie Hall.”
In 1977 she won the Cannes Film Festival Award for best actress for her role in “3 Women.” According to Variety, her role in “3 Women” led to her being cast in “The Shining.”
In a 1981 interview with People, Duvall noted that the horror movie based on Stephen King’s book catapulted her career but said filming it was challenging.
She told the magazine that director Stanley Kubrick had her “crying 12 hours a day for weeks on end.”
“I will never give that much again. If you want to get into pain and call it art, go ahead, but not with me” she said.
Wendy Torrance, played by American actress Shelley Duvall, recoils in shock as her husband chops through the bathroom door with a fire axe in a scene from ‘The Shining’, directed by Stanley Kubrick, 1980.
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Duvall started to step away from acting in the 1990s, The Associated Press reported. She last appeared in “The Forest Hills” in 2023, her first role after a 20-year hiatus.
Scott Goldberg, who directed “The Forest Hills,” remembered Duvall as a “radiant, very kind and witty” person.
“She was wonderful to work with and she did a great job. Very proud of her,” he said in a phone call Thursday.
Goldberg said having the opportunity to work with Duvall, who he considered one of his idols, was a “big accomplishment.”
Her death has left him in disbelief.
“It was automatic sadness and shock,” he said. “She was nothing but sweet and nice and sharp and I really will miss her.”