Debbie Reynolds, the Singin’ in the Rain actress who tap-danced her way into American hearts as a star of Hollywood’s Golden Age, died on Wednesday, grief-stricken over daughter Carrie Fisher’s death a day earlier.
The 84-year-old suffered a stroke at son Todd Fisher’s Beverly Hills home after telling him “I miss her so much, I want to be with Carrie,” he was quoted as telling celebrity news Web site TMZ.
Reynolds was the girl-next-door lead of a string of hit musicals in the 1950s after being discovered by MGM studio bosses at a beauty contest in southern California, going on to earn an Oscar nomination for playing the title role in 1964’s The Unsinkable Molly Brown.
Photo: EPA
“We have lost a unique talent and a national treasure. Coming so close to the death of her daughter, Carrie Fisher, this is truly a double tragedy,” Screen Actors Guild president Gabrielle Carteris said in a statement. “Their imprint on our culture is profound, and they both will live on.”
Reynolds is best remembered as sweet but shy voice artist Kathy Selden in Singin’ in the Rain (1952) and holding her own despite being cast opposite tap-dancing superstar Gene Kelly, who was more than twice her age.
Off-screen, she was known as the wronged party in one of Hollywood’s most notorious scandals, when her husband, singer Eddie Fisher, left her for her friend and fellow screen icon Elizabeth Taylor.
Reynolds’ daughter, Carrie Fisher, who catapulted to worldwide stardom as rebel warrior Princess Leia in the original Star Wars trilogy, died in Los Angeles on Tuesday, four days after suffering a heart attack on a transatlantic flight.
Media reports said Reynolds had been at her son’s house to discuss funeral arrangements.
Fans and fellow celebrities struggled to come to terms with another devastating blow so soon after Fisher’s death.
“Debbie Reynolds was one of the last of Hollywood Royalty. It breaks my heart that she is gone,” Star Trek actor William Shatner said on Twitter.
He added, referencing the long string of celebrity deaths this year: “I’d hoped that my grieving was done for 2016.”
“There is nothing harder than having to bury a child. Debbie died of a broken heart, but she’s with her daughter now,” tweeted Shatner’s Star Trek co-star turned social media personality George Takei.
“Dear Debbie Reynolds, I totally get it. Hug her so tight for all of us,” added Charmed and Who’s the Boss actress Alyssa Milano.
Reynolds, who received a humanitarian award at the Academy’s “Honorary Oscars” last year, was just 19 when she got her big break in Singin’ in the Rain, which celebrates Hollywood’s transition from the silent era into “talkies.”
Her 2013 autobiography, Unsinkable: A Memoir, detailed the highs and lows of her rocky personal life and a career which was still going strong into her 80s as she performed her one-woman stage show.
“Singin’ in the Rain and childbirth were the hardest things I ever had to do in my life,” she wrote in an earlier autobiography entitled Debbie.
Reynolds was known at one time as the foremost collector of Hollywood memorabilia. Taylor’s Cleopatra headdress and Marilyn Monroe’s billowing Seven Year Itch frock would become part of the 4,000-piece haul of costumes, props and furniture, most of which Reynolds eventually auctioned for more than US$25 million.
Mary Frances Reynolds was born on April 1, 1932 in El Paso, Texas, the second child of railroad carpenter Raymond Francis Reynolds and his wife, Maxine.
Married three times, Reynolds once said she had more luck selecting restaurants than men.
First, she had to overcome the humiliation of losing Fisher to Taylor, although the two women remained close until Taylor’s death in 2011.
In another turn of misfortune, Reynolds’ second husband, shoe magnate Harry Karl, gambled away most of her savings.
Her third marriage to real-estate developer Richard Hamlett in 1985 was not much more successful, ending in divorce in 1996.
To support the family, Reynolds performed at her casino in Las Vegas, where she housed her memorabilia collection until it shut in 1997.
Kehinde Sanni spends his days smoothing out dents and repainting scratched bumpers in a modest autobody shop in Lagos. He has never left Nigeria, yet he speaks glowingly of Burkina Faso military leader Ibrahim Traore. “Nigeria needs someone like Ibrahim Traore of Burkina Faso. He is doing well for his country,” Sanni said. His admiration is shaped by a steady stream of viral videos, memes and social media posts — many misleading or outright false — portraying Traore as a fearless reformer who defied Western powers and reclaimed his country’s dignity. The Burkinabe strongman swept into power following a coup in September 2022
‘FRAGMENTING’: British politics have for a long time been dominated by the Labor Party and the Tories, but polls suggest that Reform now poses a significant challenge Hard-right upstarts Reform UK snatched a parliamentary seat from British Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s Labor Party yesterday in local elections that dealt a blow to the UK’s two establishment parties. Reform, led by anti-immigrant firebrand Nigel Farage, won the by-election in Runcorn and Helsby in northwest England by just six votes, as it picked up gains in other localities, including one mayoralty. The group’s strong showing continues momentum it built up at last year’s general election and appears to confirm a trend that the UK is entering an era of multi-party politics. “For the movement, for the party it’s a very, very big
ENTERTAINMENT: Rio officials have a history of organizing massive concerts on Copacabana Beach, with Madonna’s show drawing about 1.6 million fans last year Lady Gaga on Saturday night gave a free concert in front of 2 million fans who poured onto Copacabana Beach in Rio de Janeiro for the biggest show of her career. “Tonight, we’re making history... Thank you for making history with me,” Lady Gaga told a screaming crowd. The Mother Monster, as she is known, started the show at about 10:10pm local time with her 2011 song Bloody Mary. Cries of joy rose from the tightly packed fans who sang and danced shoulder-to-shoulder on the vast stretch of sand. Concert organizers said 2.1 million people attended the show. Lady Gaga
SUPPORT: The Australian prime minister promised to back Kyiv against Russia’s invasion, saying: ‘That’s my government’s position. It was yesterday. It still is’ Left-leaning Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese yesterday basked in his landslide election win, promising a “disciplined, orderly” government to confront cost-of-living pain and tariff turmoil. People clapped as the 62-year-old and his fiancee, Jodie Haydon, who visited his old inner Sydney haunt, Cafe Italia, surrounded by a crowd of jostling photographers and journalists. Albanese’s Labor Party is on course to win at least 83 seats in the 150-member parliament, partial results showed. Opposition leader Peter Dutton’s conservative Liberal-National coalition had just 38 seats, and other parties 12. Another 17 seats were still in doubt. “We will be a disciplined, orderly
RSS