Kirstie Alley Dead: Star of 'Cheers' and 'Drop Dead Gorgeous' Dies at 71

[Penny Lane]

Originally Posted by Coffeecup

So sad, she could have lived another 10-15 years. I just hope she didn't suffer long. Was she currently married to Parker Stephenson or were they divorced? Cancer is brutal!

She and Parker were divorced. I read that she only lived a short time after a colon cancer diagnosis. Must have caught it too late as colon cancer is treatable. So sad

[Chocolate Moose]

Really terrible!

[TMC]

Kirstie Alley remembered by Cheers co-creator and co-stars

Alley, who died of cancer at age 71, co-starred alongside Ted Danson, Kelsey Grammer and Rhea Perlman, who each fondly remembered her and her breakout role as bar manager Rebecca Howe in the 1980s and '90s sitcom.

[MrCleveland]

Originally Posted by Penny Lane

So sad. Shocking to hear. So many celebrity deaths lately!

I won't doubt 2022 takes the cake with celebrideaths...especially since we lost Queen Elizabeth II!

But...farewell Kristie....

[TMC]

Appreciating Kirstie Alley on Cheers

Robert Lloyd
Tue, December 6, 2022 at 1:15 PM

Many television series have lost and gained characters across their lifetime, but when Kirstie Alley took over from Shelley Long as the female lead of “Cheers” in 1987, it was something epochal, almost a reboot, a new lease on life. Long’s Diane Chambers was a runaway bride, cerebral, willowy, blond, mathematically fated to be mated with Ted Danson’s bartender-proprietor Sam Malone — and they were indeed together off and on through her five seasons.

As Rebecca Howe, who came into the series as Sam’s new boss — he had sold the bar to a conglomerate — Alley, who starred in the next six seasons, was something entirely different: dark, solid, physical, throaty, with a gift for slapstick and the license to go big where Long had been contained, and — to his endless frustration — not interested in Sam at all.

I have never seen any of the three “Look Who’s Talking” films that Alley, who died Monday at age 71, made with John Travolta during and just after the run of “Cheers,” but I can only assume that she’s great in them, because I never saw her otherwise, even in shows and parts that were less deserving of her presence, less supportive of her talent. “Cheers” is one of the best written comedies in television history, however, and the combination of actor and role created the part for which she is rightly best remembered.

Rebecca’s main theme was thwarted ambition, professional and romantic — the two were mixed up in her head — limited by her own situational blindness and the corporate glass ceiling. (Sexual harassment and power relationships are repeatedly portrayed, if not exactly explored.) Watching the show now, its attitudes feel transitional: Sam is a dinosaur, whose sexual obsessiveness the series half celebrates, half critiques.

But there’s something especially interesting about his relationship with Rebecca. There’s no romance between them. His interest in her is entirely sexual — or psychosexual, driven by her lack of reciprocation — which leads ultimately to a complicated, often affecting, half-platonic friendship that had, and has, no parallel in television.

If Rebecca’s character runs a little too much to desperation in later seasons, when it comes to Landing a Man, it may have been in part that Alley was so obviously good at playing that kind of comedy, so engaging breaking down.

If thwarted ambition, physical comedy and the ability to cry funny put Alley in a line descended from Lucille Ball, she also had something of the strength and vulnerability, the rough-hewn intelligence and emotional appeal, of the great women of screwball comedy — Rosalind Russell, Barbara Stanwyck. (And like some of those stars, she could be acid on the subject of her industry, “the most suppressive business on the planet.” Asked how one remained a “hot property,” she replied, “You pour boiling water on yourself every morning.”)

She was primarily a comic actor, though she won her second Emmy, after “Cheers,” in a drama, the 1994 TV movie “David’s Mother,” as the mother of an autistic teenager, and I first saw her as Saavik, Spock's protege in the 1982 film “Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan,” her screen debut. (Not counting three episodes as a contestant on “Match Game.”) With her striking looks — green wide-set eyes and a superabundant head of hair, which she used as an expressive accessory — she was memorable from first glance, and unforgettable once she began to act.

Subsequent series did not bother to domesticate her. In the very good “Veronica’s Closet,” created by Marta Kauffman and David Crane of “Friends” fame, which ran from 1997 to 2000, she played the entrepreneurial success of Rebecca Howe’s dreams, the head of a lingerie company. In the less good, short-lived “Kirstie,” she starred as a Broadway star reunited uneasily with the unglamorous child she gave up for adoption decades earlier. And in the self-reflexive, semi-improvised “Fat Actress,” from 2005, she played a version of herself, trying to restart her career in the face of tabloid obsession with her weight.

Alley, who was also a regular in the second season of Ryan Murphy’s “Scream Queens,” continued to work in guest roles and on reality shows — this year’s edition of “The Masked Singer” was her last screen appearance. But there never was another “Cheers” or another “Look Who’s Talking” in her life, and there was never as much work as she should have had.

“What I want to do for the rest of my life is to work,” she told journalist Clive James in the 1989 British documentary “Postcard From Hollywood.” “And I think if you were like some bimbo, you know, that was like a flash in the dark that you probably would not have an opportunity to work for very long. But I don’t think I’m real bimbo-esque. If I get old and fat then I’ll do old, fat character roles, I don’t care. It’s fun.”

This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.

[Dude111]

Very sad.....

[MA]

Decades remembers Kirstie Alley with a special Cheers tribute

https://decades.com/articles/decades...-kirstie-alley

[paul.austin]

For the longest time, the list was pretty small;

Merritt Buttrick, 29, 1989
Bibi Besch, 56, 1996
DeForest Kelley, 79, 1999
Paul Winfield, 64, 2004
James Doohan, 85, 2005

Now, in the 2000's, we have to include Leonard Nimoy, Ricardo Montalban, John Winston, Paul Kent, Nichelle Nichols, and Kirstie Alley.

And back to Kirstie...
I gotta admit I had a bit of a crush on Saavik. I didn't want her to replace Spock, but I was intrigued by her character.
As for Cheers, she appeared in 149 out of 271 episodes of Cheers (compared to Shelley Long's 124), and although I'd been watching Cheers for a couple years before she came on board, looking back at re-runs of earlier episodes, I actually prefer the Kirstie Alley years more.

Semi-relevant fact; Star Trek II premiered on June 4, 1982 and Cheers premiered on September, 30, 1982.

[80sTrivia]

I was definitely shocked & saddened by this news. Kirstie was a wonderfully talented actress who brought so much to her roles, especially Rebecca on Cheers, where she created an entirely different dynamic to the series after Shelley Long departed. She will be missed greatly...

[TMC]

Originally Posted by Penny Lane

She and Parker were divorced. I read that she only lived a short time after a colon cancer diagnosis. Must have caught it too late as colon cancer is treatable. So sad

Her divorce was 'an ugly process'

Kirstie Alley was married to "The Hardy Boys" actor Parker Stevenson for 14 years. It was a surprise that their union lasted that long, given that Stevenson was nothing like Alley. "Kirstie and I are exact opposites," he told People. "In any social situation, Kirstie lights up the room. I just tend to be in the room."

During the course of their marriage, Alley would develop other love interests; Patrick Swayze, with whom she appeared on the ABC miniseries "North & South," and her "Look Who's Talking" co-star, John Travolta. "I would have loved to have an affair with Patrick Swayze but we were both married," she said on "Celebrity Big Brother UK." The couple eventually divorced, in what Stevenson described to People as an ugly process. According to the 1999 interview, it took a little over a year for the pair to reach a consensual agreement over child support and custody. Stevenson's $75,000 per month request was set aside, and he opted for a number of shared assets, amongst them a Maine residence.

Unfaithfulness didn't play a part in Alley and Stevenson's separation as the former let Entertainment Weekly in the know in a 1997 interview (via People): "There was no infidelity in my marriage, on either side....There was nothing other than maybe different goals in life."

[Lyverbe]

It's no surprise that they've been playing "Look Who's Talking" on TV for the last couple of days now. Made me realize again that Kirstie had the most unbelievable eyes. Absolutely stunning.

[TVShowAddict]

Originally Posted by Lyverbe

It's no surprise that they've been playing "Look Who's Talking" on TV for the last couple of days now. Made me realize again that Kirstie had the most unbelievable eyes. Absolutely stunning.

The first 2 movies was good, the 3rd movie was horrible, it even bombed at the box office, the 3rd movie does not exist to me

[BestTVever]

She made a brilliant career move almost by accident. Actors that are hired to replace the same character rarely work. When Shelly left she was hired but she insisted only on a 1 season contract. Why would anyone want to only sign for one season on a top 10 TV show. She was not sure she would be happy. But this decision reaped HUGE benefits. When she joined the show the ratings went way up and when it was time for a new contract she got the sun and moon to resign. If she had done what 99% of all other actors would have done, they would have locked her in at a low rate.

[TMC]

I was reminded elsewhere that Kirstie's death is actually kind similar to Markie Post's last year.

Both women came in as replacements for their respected '80s sitcoms (Markie for Ellen Foley on Night Court and Kirstie for Shelley Long on Cheers) and they lasted longer though Markie replaced more of a hodgepodge.

Both women carried themselves as more professional women as the characters but really made a connection on screen and with their co-stars in real life. They even dressed similar with the suit type outfits.

Markie passed from cancer as did Kirstie. Markie was 70, Kirstie was 71. And both women's illnesses weren't really reported at least from what we could see.

[TMC]

Originally Posted by Lyverbe

It's no surprise that they've been playing "Look Who's Talking" on TV for the last couple of days now. Made me realize again that Kirstie had the most unbelievable eyes. Absolutely stunning.

Before Cheers, Kirstie was kind of typecast as a sci-fi vixen. She of course, was in Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, but she was also in this film with Tom Selleck called Runaway.



She actually kind of looked similar to Meg Foster. If don't know who Meg Foster is, she was Evil-Lyn in the live-action Masters of the Universe film, she was in John Carpenter's They Live with "Rowdy" Roddy Piper, and she preceded Sharon Gless as Det. Christine Cagney on Cagney and Lacey.