Val Kilmer has died. The actor known for his roles in films like Batman Forever, Top Gun, and The Doors was 65 years old.
The performer’s death was confirmed by the New York Times, which revealed it was the result of pneumonia. As fans of Kilmer know, the actor battled throat cancer on and off for several years since 2015.
Born in Los Angeles in 1959, Kilmer was raised by his father Eugene and mother Gladys and attended high school with famous classmates like Mare Winningham. He was accepted into the Juilliard School and was the youngest student at the time of his attendance. He went on to appear in various stage productions, making his Broadway debut opposite Sean Penn and Kevin Bacon in 1983’s The Slab Boys.
From there, he made his way to film and television, and he made his feature debut in 1984 with the spy parody Top Secret! from David Zucker, Jim Abrahams, and Jerry Zucker. This set the stage for his career as a full-on movie star, which paved the way for his memorable role as Tom “Iceman” Kazansky, antagonist to Tom Cruise‘s Maverick in Top Gun, a role he later reprised in 2022’s lauded sequel Top Gun: Maverick.
Everett Collection
Among his other notable roles were Bruce Wayne, a.k.a. Batman, in 1995’s Batman Forever, Jim Morrison in Oliver Stone‘s biopic The Doors, and Doc Holliday in Tombstone. Other films Kilmer is best known for are Heat, Willow, True Romance, The Island of Dr. Moreau, Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang, The Salton Sea, The Ghost and the Darkness, The Saint, and At First Sight. Additionally, Kilmer voiced Moses in DreamWorks’ 1998 animated feature The Prince of Egypt.
He also made a hilarious turn in 2010’s MacGruber, a MacGyver spoof led by Will Forte and costarring Kristen Wiig and Ryan Phillippe. Kilmer played big bad Dieter von Cunth in the film based on the Saturday Night Live character.
Among Kilmer’s television credits are Saturday Night Live, Entourage, Psych, and even lent his voice to KITT in NBC‘s reimagining of Knight Rider. He was also a published author, penning a collection of poems known as My Edens After Burns, which was partly inspired by Michelle Pfeiffer.
Over the years, Kilmer was romantically linked to several well-known stars, including Cher, Ellen Barkin, Cindy Crawford, Angelina Jolie, Daryl Hannah, and more. In 1988, Kilmer married actress Joanne Whalley, with whom he had a daughter, Mercedes, and a son, Jack, but they broke off their relationship by 1996.
In 2021, Kilmer offered fans a candid look at his life and career with the documentary Val, a project that also included insights from his kids and offered a deeper look at pivotal moments from his life, including the loss of his brother Wesley at a young age. The actor’s son, Jack, narrates the documentary as he lost his ability to speak through his throat cancer battle.
This story originally appeared on TV Insider
