Shelley Duvall, Actress Known for ‘The Shining’ and ‘Nashville,’ Dies at 75

Shelley Duvall, the spirited Texas-born film star known for her wide-eyed, charming presence in Robert Altman’s films and her co-starring role in Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining, has passed away. She was 75.

Duvall died Thursday in her sleep at her home in Blanco, Texas, as announced by her long-term partner, Dan Gilroy. Her friend, publicist Gary Springer, shared that the cause of death was complications from diabetes.

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

Duvall was attending junior college in Texas when Altman’s crew, preparing for the filming of Brewster McCloud, encountered her at a party in Houston in 1970. Subsequently, she became Altman’s protégé.

Duvall would go on to appear in Altman’s films including Thieves Like Us, Nashville, Popeye, Three Women” and “McCabe & Ms. Miller.

“He offers me … good roles,” Duvall told The New York Times in 1977. “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.’”

Duvall, with her lean frame and awkward gait, was not a conventional Hollywood starlet. However, she possessed an engagingly candid demeanor and exuded a unique naturalism. Film critic Pauline Kael referred to her as the “female Buster Keaton.”

At the height of her career, Duvall was a prominent star in some of the most defining films of the 1970s and 1980s. In The Shining, she played Wendy Torrance, who witnesses with horror as her husband, Jack (Jack Nicholson), descends into madness while their family is isolated in the Overlook Hotel. It was Duvall’s screaming face that constituted half of the film’s most iconic image, alongside Jack’s axe breaking through the door.

However, Duvall’s departure from movies was almost as swift as her arrival. By the 1990s, she began withdrawing from acting. Her final film role was in 2002’s Manna From Heaven. Duvall retreated from public life. Earlier this year, she granted her first interview in years.

“How would you feel if people were really nice, and then, suddenly, on a dime”—she snapped her fingers—“they turn on you?” Duvall told the Times. “You would never believe it unless it happens to you. That’s why you get hurt, because you can’t really believe it’s true.”