Val Kilmer, an actor known for his work in Top Gun, Willow and Batman Forever, has died, The New York Times reports. He was 65.
Kilmer died of pneumonia yesterday (April 1) in Los Angeles, his daughter, Mercedes Kilmer, told the Times. He had been diagnosed with throat cancer in 2014, which he later recovered from.
The actor was born in Los Angeles on Dec. 31, 1959 and grew up in the city, later moving to New York to study acting at Juilliard, where he was one of the youngest students there at 17, per the Times. From there, he was cast in Broadway’s The Slab Boys in 1983 alongside Sean Penn and Kevin Bacon, just two years after he graduated.
His first credits in film and television include Top Secret!, ABC Afterschool Specials, Real Genius and Top Gun. He went on to appear in Willow, where he played Madmartigan and met his wife, Joanne Whalley (the two later divorced after welcoming two children). Kilmer’s other notable credits from this period included playing Jim Morrison in 1991’s The Doors, as well as roles in Thunderheart, True Romance, The Real McCoy, Tombstone, and Wings of Courage.
In 1995, he took on the iconic role of Batman/Bruce Wayne in Batman Forever, a film directed by Joel Schumacher and co-starring Jim Carrey, Nicole Kidman, Drew Barrymore and Tommy Lee Jones. His superhero stint was followed by work on Heat, The Island of Dr. Moreau, The Saint, The Prince of Egypt and At First Sight.
In the early 2000s, Kilmer worked on Red Planet, The Salton Sea, Hard Cash, Wonderland, Spartan, Mindhunters and appeared in an episode of the popular HBO series Entourage. His other TV credits included Numb3rs, Knight Rider, Life’s Too Short, Ghost Ghirls, Psych and Robot Chicken.
Kilmer acted in a number of recent films before his final onscreen credit in 2022’s Top Gun: Maverick, in which he reprised his role as Adm. Tom ‘Iceman’ Kazansky alongside Tom Cruise.
In the year prior, Kilmer let cameras into his own life in 2021’s Val, which chronicled his health and his life. It held the title for Prime Video’s most-watched documentary in the U.S. before Kelce claimed the spot. DECIDER’s John Serba praised the film as “contemplative, indulgent, engrossing” in his Val review, writing, “Val always feels like art, and therefore truth.”
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