Death seriously needs to take a holiday. Today, we say goodbye to Valerie Perrine, whose roles in movies like Superman (1978), Superman II (1980), Lenny (1974), and Slaughterhouse-Five (1972) helped make those cinematic gems unforgettable. Perrine passed away today after a 15-year battle with Parkinson’s disease. She was 82.
Perrine’s friend, Stacey Souther, who organized Perrine’s GoFundMe page to help pay for funeral costs, broke the news.
“Valerie Perrine gave everything she had to her craft, her fans, and her life — with grace, humor, and an indomitable spirit that Parkinson’s itself could never fully extinguish,” Souther writes. “Let’s make sure her final chapter is written with the same dignity and love that she gave to all of us.”
Highlighting some of Valerie Perrine’s most memorable roles
Valerie Perrine made her feature film debut as Montana Wildhack in 1972’s Slaughterhouse-Five. The role in the George Roy Hill-directed time-travel satire made her an actress to watch, with one of her most memorable roles, starring as Lenny Bruce’s wife, Honey, in Bob Fosse’s Lenny, just around the corner in 1974. While Perrine was a show-stopper in all respects, most cinephiles know her as Eve Teschmacher in Richard Donner’s Superman, a role she reprised in Donner’s Superman II in 1980. Teschmacher is the personal assistant and love interest of Lex Luthor. Perrine’s chemistry with Gene Hackman’s Luthor is a highlight of the first two Superman films, which helped cement Perrine’s place in Hollywood history.
Unfortunately, 1980 was also the year Perrine appeared in the Village People flop Can’t Stop the Music, a performance that earned her a Razzie Award nomination. Yet another reason I dislike the Razzies. “It ruined my career,” Perrine later said. “I moved to Europe after, I was so embarrassed.”
Perrinie continues on from her Can’t Stop the Music role
Regardless of the Can’t Stop the Music fallout, Perrine picked up the pieces with other feature roles, as well as parts in television series such as Faerie Tale Theatre, George Burns Comedy Week, Leo & Liz in Beverly Hills, CBS Summer Playhouse, Northern Exposure, Ghostwriter, ER, Nash Bridges, and more. She also did an eight-episode stint as Delores Pierce in the daytime soap opera As the World Turns. Pirre continued to appear in TV series and feature films until her final role in Rosemary Rodriguez’s 2016 comedy Silver Skies.
We here at JoBlo wish Ms. Perrine safe passage to the Great Hereafter, and thank her for sharing her talents with the world.
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