Val Kilmer dead at 65: Batman and Top Gun star passes away after long health battle
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Hollywood star Val Kilmer - famed for iconic roles in Top Gun, Batman and The Doors - has died at 65 after a long health battle.
His daughter Mercedes Kilmer, whom he shared with ex-wife Joanne Whalley, revealed he passed from pneumonia in Los Angeles on Tuesday.
The screen icon was diagnosed with throat cancer in 2014 and underwent surgery, including a tracheotomy which significantly impacted his ability to speak. He was later declared cancer free.
Kilmer was known for his role as Iceman in the 1986 hit movie Top Gun and as Batman/Bruce Wayne in the 1995 Batman Forever. Despite his permanently damaged voice, he made a brief return to the screen in 2022's Top Gun: Maverick, reprising his role as Iceman opposite Tom Cruise. It was his final big screen appearance.
The Los Angeles native also famously played musician Jim Morrison in the 1991 film The Doors.
Aside from Mercedes, 33, he is also survived by son Jack Kilmer, 29. Kilmer was married to their mother, fellow actress Joanne, from 1988 until 1996.
His death was confirmed by the New York Times on Tuesday.
Kilmer underwent both radiotherapy and chemotherapy for his cancer as well as a tracheostomy a procedure to create an artificial hole in this neck to help him breathe.
The latter permanently damaged his vocal cords and consequentially forever altered his speaking voice.
Kilmer reported in 2020 that he had been cancer-free for four years.
Leading the tributes to the fallen star was his friend and fellow actor Josh Brolin.
The No Country For Old Men star who shared a throwback photo of the two actors grinning ear-to-ear sometime prior to an emergency tracheotomy Kilmer had in 2014 after his throat cancer was discovered.
'See ya, pal,' Brolin captioned the photo affectionately. 'I'm going to miss you.'
He praised Kilmer as a 'smart, challenging, brave, uber-creative firecracker,' adding, 'There's not a lot left of those.'
'I hope to see you up there in the heavens when I eventually get there,' Brolin continued. 'Until then, amazing memories, lovely thoughts.'
In a post on Instagram, the actor Josh Gad shared a photo of Kilmer in glories days from the filming of Top Gun.
'RIP Val Kilmer. Thank you for defining so many of the movies of my childhood. You truly were an icon,' he captioned the post.
The comic actor and filmmaker Jorma Taccone, who is part of The Lonely Island with Andy Samberg and Akiva Schaffer, simply wrote 'love you, Val' in a post on X (formerly Twitter).
The sports guru and podcast Bill Simmons shared what looked like a photo of a polaroid of Kilmer in costume on the set of Heat.
'There wasn't anyone quite like Val Kilmer. Really enjoyed his work. RIP,' he wrote.
In the Amazon Prime documentary entitled Val, Kilmer spoke candidly about living with the consequences of throat cancer including having to use an electric device called a voice box on the artificial hole in his throat to talk.
'I obviously am sounding much worse than I feel. I can't speak without plugging this hole [in his throat],' he said.
A voice box device is most commonly a battery-operated machine that produces sound to create a voice, and is used to help those suffering with throat cancer communicate.
The actor, who also had to have meals through a feeding tube, explained some of the other challenges.
'You have to make the choice to breathe or to eat. It's an obstacle that is very present with whoever sees me,' he said.
Val's son provided the voice-over narration of the documentary but his lines were written by Val himself.
Kilmer has previously detailed how he was unaware he had throat cancer until one day he coughed up 'coagulated blood' and called for an ambulance before passing out.
He then woke up in a Santa Monica hospital after an emergency tracheotomy for throat cancer.
Speaking to the New York Times about denying he had throat cancer, he explained: 'They said I was denying that I had cancer, and when they asked me, I didn’t have cancer. It was a bit like do you have a broken bone? And if you broke it in high school, you would say no.'
In 2020, Kilmer said he 'healed very quickly' following his throat cancer diagnosis, in an interview with Good Morning America.
'This is a tracheotomy,' he said while holding his hand to his throat, 'to help me breathe because the glands in my throat swelled up as well'.
When asked what he misses the most about his voice, Kilmer told GMA: 'That I had one! And that I didn't laugh like a pirate.'
While he stopped attending red carpet events in 2019, Kilmer kept up with fans by sharing his artwork and rare selfies to his Instagram.
And less than two months before his death, Kilmer published what would be one of his final social media posts on February 23, 2025.
He uploaded haunting footage of himself hanging out in a padded room with artist/musician David Choe, which was originally filmed in 2021.
The star looked relatively healthy with a slim build, clean-shaven face and his hair worn slightly long.
In the clip, Kilmer spoke briefly before trying on a custom Batman mask made for him by Choe.
Kilmer quipped that it's 'been awhile' since he's relived his Batman glory days.
After putting the mask on, Kilmer stared into the camera before panning to a colorful Batman portrait that was presumably painted for him by Choe.
Along with the video, Kilmer shared visuals of Choe's other Batman-related artwork as well as clips of the artist talking about his love for the superhero.
Kilmer did not caption the February 2023 post, which garnered nearly 30,000 'likes' from his 634,000 Instagram followers.
Kilmer's actual final Instagram post was published on March 22.
It featured a photo of one of his original paintings, which he'd signed and posted on his website for sale.
'It's got that late-night glow,' he wrote of the artwork. 'Cool tones with a low burn, like when the camp fire cools down but you're still wide awake.'
Kilmer was one of Hollywood's most prominent leading men in the 1990s before numerous spats with directors and co-stars and a series of flops dented his career.
Over the years, Kilmer gained a reputation as temperamental, intense, perfectionistic and sometimes egotistical.
'When certain people criticize me for being demanding, I think that's a cover for something they didn't do well. I think they're trying to protect themselves,' Kilmer told the Orange County Register newspaper in 2003.
'I believe I'm challenging, not demanding, and I make no apologies for that.'
Kilmer was born December 31, 1959, in Los Angeles to Gladys Swanette and Eugene Dorris Kilmer. His parents divorced in 1968 when he was 8 years old. His younger brother Wesley drowned in a jacuzzi at the age of 15.
Kilmer attended Chatsworth High School with Kevin Spacey, and later became the youngest person at the time to be accepted into the famed Juilliard School’s Drama Group.
He made his film debut starring in the spy spoof Top Secret! (1984) before appearing in the goofy comedy Real Genius (1985).
He rocketed to stardom as Tom Cruise's co-star in the smash 1986 hit Top Gun (1986), playing naval aviator Tom 'Iceman' Kazansky, and decades later appeared alongside Cruise again in the 2022 sequel Top Gun: Maverick.
Kilmer was thrilled for the opportunity to reprise his role as Iceman in Top Gun: Maverick.
The actor was famous for playing the calm, cool rival to Tom Cruise's Maverick in the original 1986 film.
However, when the actor admitted in a 2013 interview will Larry King that he had not been approached about appearing in a proposed Top Gun sequel, Cruise reportedly rallied the troops to ensure his buddy was included.
In an interview with People, producer Jerry Bruckheimer declared, 'Tom said he wasn't going to make the movie without him.'
As such, once the final script was approved, it made allowances for Ice who had been promoted to Admiral to take part in the fun.
'So the fact that he was able to do it and he worked with us on the script,' explained the producer, 'to have him there and be a part of it was a really emotional day when we filmed him. Because you want to see those two on the screen again, Iceman and Maverick going at it. And that's what movie making and audiences love.'
That particular element is one that received high marks from critics and fans alike.
Val's son, Jack recalled how 'stoked' his father was to be joining the cast.
'[My sister,] Mercedes, and I went down to San Diego to that big naval base for the shoot with Tom Cruise and everyone. And there were hundreds of extras of real pilots coming up to us and telling us that the first Top Gun inspired them to join the Navy and the Air Force.'
'It was one of the proudest moments of being American that you could think of really.'
Kilmer starred in director Ron Howard's fantasy Willow (1988) and married his British co-star Joanne, with whom he had two children before divorcing.
One of his most challenging roles came in director Oliver Stone's The Doors (1991) in which he played Jim Morrison, the charismatic and ultimately doomed lead singer of the influential rock band The Doors.
To try to persuade Stone to cast him, Kilmer put together an eight-minute video of himself singing and looking like Morrison at various points in his life. Kilmer's own singing voice is used in the film.
The Doors ushered in the highest-profile years of his career. In the 1993 Western Tombstone, he played Old West gunfighter Doc Holliday.
He had two commercial successes in 1995, co-starring with Al Pacino and Robert De Niro in the crime drama Heat and succeeding Michael Keaton as the Caped Crusader in Batman Forever, the third installment in the Batman series.
Batman Forever was received tepidly by critics, and Kilmer was upstaged by co-stars Tommy Lee Jones and Jim Carrey. Kilmer pulled out of the next Batman movie.
Director Joel Schumacher called Kilmer 'the most psychologically troubled human being I've ever worked with.'
In 2020, Kilmer revealed he had been single since the year 2000 in his memoir, I'm Your Huckleberry.
'I haven't had a girlfriend in 20 years. The truth is I am lonely part of every day,' he wrote.
'I've always found women infinitely more interesting than men. Perhaps that's why we've always gotten along. We are big oafy elephants...and they are butterflies.'
Val was pictured kissing Winona Ryder in 2005 and claimed to have dated his Alexander leading lady Angelina Jolie in 2004, but apparently they were not committed relationships.
Kilmer has loved some of the most beautiful women in the world including romances with Daryl Hannah and Cindy Crawford.
The Jay and Silent Bob Reboot actor has especially kind words for his ex-girlfriend Cher, who allowed him to move into her Malibu guest house after he was diagnosed with throat cancer in 2015.
'Once Cher works her way inside your head and heart, she never leaves. For her true friends, her steadfast love and loyalty never die,' Val wrote.
Despite his acclaimed career, Kilmer never received an Oscar or Emmy nomination, with his closest brush with a major award being a 2012 Grammy nomination for Best Spoken Word Album for The Mask of Zorro.
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