The Shining Shelley Duvall, 75, dies at home after health complications

Shelley Duvall has died at the age of 75, her partner has confirmed.

The late actress, best known for her performance opposite Jack Nicholson in Stanley Kubrick‘s The Shining, passed away due to complications from diabetes at her Texas home on Thursday.

“My dear, sweet, wonderful life partner and friend left us. Too much suffering lately, now she’s free. Fly away, beautiful Shelley,” Shelley’s life partner Dan Gilroy said as he broke the news of his love’s death to The Hollywood Reporter.

Tributes poured in for the late star as news of her death broke on Thursday night, with one mourner writing on Twitter (X): “I honestly feel so heartbroken. Shelley Duvall made me fall in love with watching actors transform on screen. truly no one like her, we lost an icon.”

Actress Riley Keough, granddaughter of Elvis Presley, took to social media to share her tribute, a poignant photo of the star in her acting heyday with the caption: “Legend.” Hunger Games actress Rachel Zegler also shared a snap of the late actress on Instagram alongside a broken heart emoji.

Several years prior to her passing, Shelley publicly discussed her health issues – both physical and mental illnesses. The actress told Dr. Phil on his talk show in November 2016: “I am very sick. I need help.”

Shelley, known and loved for her distinctive beauty and saucer-like eyes, was born July 7, 1949 in Fort Worth, Texas, the eldest of four children. Her career in the entertainment industry began in the 1970s when she met Robert Altman, an American film director, while he was shooting Brewster McCloud on location in Texas.

Robert was drawn to Shelley and asked her to be part of the project. “I got tired of arguing, and thought maybe I am an actress,” Shelley said when recalling signing up for the feature. “They told me to come. I simply got on a plane and did it. I was swept away.” She then left Hollywood for Texas and appeared in films like McCabe and Mrs. Miller (1971), Thieves Live Us (1974) and Nashville (1975).

Her big break came in 1977, when she starred as Mildred ‘Millie’ Lammoreaux in Robert Alltman’s thriller 3 Women. Her performance earned her a Best Actress award at the 1977 Cannes Film Festival and a BAFTA nomination. The same year, Shelley had a minor role in Woody Allen’s hit film Annie Hall.

It was Shelley’s next role that made her a household name and propelled her to a new level of stardom. Playing Wendy Torrance in The Shining in 1980 was possibly Shelley’s most notable work of her entire career, with her performance and her working relationship with director Stanley Kubrick still discussed decades on from filming.

In 2021, Shelley gave a rare interview about working alongside Jack Nicholson and spoke of the intense pressure she faced while shooting some of the movie’s most harrowing scenes back in 1980.

Having stepped away from acting since 2002, Shelley lived quietly in the years that followed, but opened up to the Hollywood Reporter from her residence near Texas Hill County about the ‘difficult’ experience, which was marked by an exhausting number of retakes.

“[Kubrick] doesn’t print anything until at least the 35th take,” she told the outlet. “Thirty-five takes, running and crying and carrying a little boy, it gets hard. And full performance from the first rehearsal. That’s difficult.”

To get into the emotional depths required for Wendy, Shelley divulged that she would listen to melancholic music on her Walkman to help her tap into the necessary emotions. “You just think about something very sad in your life or how much you miss your family or friends,” she explained. “But after a while, your body rebels. It says: ‘Stop doing this to me. I don’t want to cry every day.’ And sometimes just that thought alone would make me cry.”

She expressed surprise at her own ability to produce tears on demand throughout the production. Shelley opened up about her time with director Kubrick, describing him as ‘friendly’ and someone who enjoyed in-depth conversations with his lead actors. “He was very warm and friendly to me,” she revealed. “He spent a lot of time with Jack and me. He just wanted to sit down and talk for hours while the crew waited. And the crew would say, ‘Stanley, we have about 60 people waiting.’ But it was very important work.”

Throughout the 1980s, Shelley worked as a producer on a number of TV shows and in 1988, founded her production company Think Entertainment. In 1992, Think Entertainment teamed up with the newly established Universal Family Entertainment to produce Shelley Duvall’s fourth original series for Showtime, Shelley Duvall’s Bedtime Stories. The show, which presented animated versions of children’s storybooks narrated by celebrities, earned Shelley her second Emmy nomination.

Shelley continued to grace the screens in both film and television throughout the late 1990s. In 1998, she portrayed Mrs. Jackson in the comedy Home Fries and Gabby in the direct-to-video children’s flick Casper Meets Wendy. As the decade drew to a close, she revisited her horror roots with a minor role in Tale of the Mummy (1998), sharing the screen with Christopher Lee and Gerard Butler, and The 4th Floor (1999), alongside Juliette Lewis.

In the 2000s, Duvall took on smaller roles, including playing the mother of Matthew Lawrence’s character in the horror-comedy Boltneck (2000) and Haylie Duff’s aunt in the independent family film Dreams in the Attic, which was sold to the Disney Channel but never saw release. After a brief appearance in the 2002 indie film Manna from Heaven, Duvall decided to take a break from acting and retreated from public life. After a 20-year hiatus, Shelley returned to the world of acting in October 2022, when it was announced she would be starring in an independent horror film titled The Forest Hills.

In addition to her acting career, Shelley recorded Sweet Dreams, an album of music for children in 1991, and a year later Showtime bought her pitch for ‘Faerie Tale Theatre’, which she executive produced, narrated and appeared on, In 1985, Shelley created another showtime series, ‘Tall Tales and Legends’, with both programmes featuring a string of star guests – including the likes of Sir Mick Jagger, Lisa Minelli, Jeff Bridges, and Vanessa Redgrave – who she persuaded to work for scale.

Shelley married artist Bernard Sampson in 1970 but they divorced four years later. She went on to date Paul Simon, who she met while filming Annie Hall, but the musician eventually left her for her friend Carrie Fisher. She also lived with Popeye co-star Stan Wilson and then dated Madonna‘s former boyfriend, who she met while starring in Disney Channel movie Mother Goose Rock ‘n’ Rhyme.

She is survived by her partner Dan Gilroy and three younger brothers, Scott, Stewart and Shane Duvall.

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