LOS ANGELES – Jessica Walter, whose roles as a scheming matriarch in TV’s “Arrested Development” and a stalker in “Play Misty for Me” have been in line with a job that drew on her astringent monitor presence extra than her great appears to be, has died. She was 80.
Walter’s dying was verified Thursday by her daughter, Brooke Bowman, an leisure business executive. A cause of demise and other particulars have been not instantly provided.
“It is with a significant coronary heart that I verify the passing of my beloved mom Jessica. A functioning actor for above 6 a long time, her biggest satisfaction was bringing joy to some others by way of her storytelling the two on screen and off,” Bowman claimed in a statement.
Walter will also be very well-remembered for “her wit, course and total joie de vivre,” or life of enjoy, her daughter added.
Though her photogenic visual appeal might have qualified her for normal top woman roles, Walter claimed no regrets about getting forged as a character actor.
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She liked taking part in tricky girls mainly because “those are the exciting roles. They are juicy, a great deal far better than enjoying the vanilla ingénues, you know—Miss Vanilla Ice Cream,” Walter stated in an AV Club site interview.
Her most memorable film role was in Clint Eastwood’s 1971 thriller “Play Misty For Me” — her 1st considerable direct — in which she plays Evelyn Draper, the woman who becomes obsessed with Eastwood’s disc jockey character. Walter was extensively praised for her unnerving general performance.
Roger Ebert wrote in his overview that, “She is some thing like flypaper the much more you battle towards her identity, the a lot more tightly you are held.”
“Arrested Development” represented a second act for Walter, and attained her admiration from a new technology of supporters.
Walter’s attribute debut was in the 1964 film “Lilith,” with Warren Beatty, Jean Seberg and Gene Hackman, who was also on his to start with movie.
She gained a position in John Frankenheimer’s racing epic “Grand Prix,” from 1966, as the glamorous but discontented wife of a Formula Just one racer who falls for an additional driver.
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That exact same yr she appeared in Sidney Lumet’s “The Team,” a woman-led ensemble about the graduates of a prestigious college (Walter performed the catty Libby), and acted for Lumet once more in 1968’s “Bye Bye Braverman.”
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AP Film Writer Lindsey Bahr and AP Amusement Writer Andrew Dalton contributed to this report.
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