Shelley Duvall, star of The Shining and several Robert Altman classics, dead at 75

Shelley Duvall, the intrepid, Texas-born movie star whose wide-eyed, winsome presence was a mainstay in the films of Robert Altman and who co-starred with Jack Nicholson in Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining, has died. She was 75.

Duvall died Thursday in her sleep at her home in Blanco, Texas, her longtime partner, Dan Gilroy, announced. The cause was complications of diabetes, said her friend the publicist Gary Springer.

“My dear, sweet, wonderful life, partner and friend left us last night,” Gilroy said in a statement. “Too much suffering lately.  Now, she’s free. Fly away beautiful Shelley.”

Duvall, gaunt and gawky, was no conventional Hollywood starlet. But she had a beguiling, frank manner, with film critic Pauline Kael calling her the “female Buster Keaton.”

Kubrick infamously tough on her

In arguably her most famous role, in 1980’s The Shining, she played Wendy Torrance, who watches in horror as her husband, portrayed by Jack Nicholson, goes crazy while their family is isolated in the Overlook Hotel. It was Duvall’s screaming face that made up half of the film’s most iconic image, along with Nicholson’s axe coming through the door.

Kubrick, a famous perfectionist, was notoriously hard on Duvall in making the film. Some saw Kubrick’s treatment as bordering on torture; one scene reportedly took 127 takes.

Duvall, in an interview in 1981 with People magazine, said she was crying “12 hours a day for weeks on end” during the film’s production.

“I will never give that much again,” said Duvall. “If you want to get into pain and call it art, go ahead, but not with me.”

Cannes Film Fest honour

Duvall, the oldest of four, was born in Fort Worth, Texas, on July 7, 1949. Her father, Robert worked in law and her mother, Bobbie, in real estate.

She was attending junior college in Texas when Altman’s staff, preparing to film Brewster McCloud, encountered her as at a party in Houston in 1970.

She would go on to become an Altman regular for the next decade, appearing in his Western opus McCabe & Mrs. Miller, the sprawling, critically acclaimed Nashville, the Paul Newman vehicle Buffalo Bill and the Indians, or Sitting Bull’s History Lesson and the motion picture version of Popeye alongside Robin Williams.

On Thursday, actor Wendell Pierce, beloved for his role as Detective Bunk on The Wire, fondly recalled seeing Duvall as Olive Oil in Popeye for the first time. “A moment I cherish to this day as a part of my innocent youth,” he wrote on X.

Duvall was named best actress at the Cannes Film Festival for 1977’s 3 Women, directed by Altman and co-starring Sissy Spacek.

“He offers me damn good roles,” Duvall told The New York Times that same year. “None of them have been alike. He has a great confidence in me, and a trust and respect for me, and he doesn’t put any restrictions on me or intimidate me, and I love him. I remember the first advice he ever gave me: ‘Don’t take yourself seriously.'”

Her other Altman film appearance was three years earlier in the little-seen Thieves Like Us.

Duvall also appeared in a small role in Woody Allen’s Oscar-winning Annie Hall, as well as in Time Bandits and the Steve Martin comedy Roxanne.

Emmy-nominated children’s shows

In the 1980s, she helped create and star in the children’s television series Faerie Tale Theatre — winner of a Peabody Award — as well as its folklore followup, Shelley Duvall’s Tall Tales and Legends. The latter show as well as the 1992 animated short Shelley Duvall’s Bedtime Stories earned Emmy nominations.

In later years, Duvall encountered physical and mental health challenges, appearing on a controversial 2016 episode of Dr. Phil. Some television viewers and critics took aim at the show host Dr. Phil McGraw for what they said was an exploitative segment.

“I’m very sick. I need help,” Duvall said on the program.

To those living in Texas Hill Country, where Duvall lived for some 30 years, she was neither in “hiding” nor a recluse, but her circumstances were a mystery to both the media and many of her old Hollywood friends.

Hollywood Reporter journalist Seth Abramovitch said he went on a pilgrimage to find her for a rare feature article in 2021 because, “it didn’t feel right for McGraw’s insensitive sideshow to be the final word on her legacy.”

Duvall attempted to restart her career. In her first on screen role in 20 years, she was cast in indie horror The Forest Hills, which came out in 2023.