Houstonian and actor Shelley Duvall recently passed away at the age of 75, at her home in the Texas Hill Country, opens a new window. Her acting career began when she met the film crew of director Robert Altman at a party in Houston, Texas, or so the legend goes. A strange and ethereal beauty with a southern accent, her first film role was in the Altman film Brewster McCloud, a dark comedy filmed in Houston and the Astrodome. Altman and Duvall went on to collaborate on seven movies “including Nashville, Thieves Like Us, McCabe & Mrs. Miller, Popeye and 3 Women, for which Ms. Duvall won the 1977 Best Actress Award at Cannes.”, opens a new window
The Shelley Duvall films Brewster McCloud, Popeye, and Bernice Bobs Her Hair are all available to stream by logging in to the Kanopy, opens a new window app with your library card.
Film Critic Roger Ebert wrote, opens a new window:
"Duvall is like a precious piece of china with a tinkling personality. She looks and sounds like almost nobody else, and if it is true that she was born to play the character Olive Oyl (and does so in Altman's new musical Popeye), it is also true that she has possibly played more really different kinds of characters than almost any other young actress of the 1970s."
I have a particular fondness for hearing Shelley Duvall sing “He needs me, opens a new window” as the character Olive Oyl in the film Popeye, based on the cartoon, which is used to great effect in the film Punch Drunk Love, opens a new window. If you enjoy Shelley Duvall the singer, there are a couple of albums that you can listen to by logging into the music app Freegal, opens a new window with your library card.
One of her most famous roles, as Wendy Torrance in the film The Shining, was also probably one of her most controversial. This is partly due to speculation that director Stanley Kubrick tormented her to elicit her performance. At the time of the film’s release, she was given a Golden Razzie, but they have since retracted it, opens a new window. I think filming such dark subject matter with a demanding director like Kubrick, who requires actors to do scenes many, many times, must have been extremely difficult, if not traumatizing, but I think Shelley Duvall deserves more credit than she often gets for being an excellent performer.
It's a testament to how good her acting skills were that many of her films are still in the Harris County Public Library film collection, in spite of the fact that they were released decades ago. I highly recommend that you check them out!
In the latter years of her career Shelley Duvall used her talents to create and produce multiple children’s television series and brought in many of her famous actor friends, like Robin Williams, Sissy Spacek, Ringo Starr, John Candy and more to play characters from famous nursery rhymes, fairy tales, and tall tales. The most famous of these television shows was called Faerie Tale Theater and it has been known most recently in the internet world for compilations of Shelley Duvall introducing the show by saying "Hello, I'm Shelley Duvall, opens a new window!"
Many of these are available for check out at the library, and you can share them with a younger family member, or watch them for the joy and nostalgia.
The Princess Who Had Never Laughed
Shelley Duvall's Tall Tales & Legends
Are you a Shelley Duvall fan? Did she star in one of your favorite films? Tell us about it in the comments!
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