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It’s been a hot minute since legendary actress Shelley Duvall made the Hollywood movie-making scene with turns in everything from Woody Allen’s far-out date in Annie Hall to the comic-strip to screen translation of Popeye the Sailor Man (where she played a spot-on Olive Oyle to Robin Williams’ Popeye). But there perhaps may be no greater signature role for the stalwart actress than her bravura performance as a belleagured wife named Wendy Torrance to Jack Nicholson’s tormented husband Jack Torrance in Staley Kubrick’s Stephen King chiller The Shining. In that one film, Duvall pulled out all of the stops as one of the original bad-ass women who can kick some serious ass when forced to do so. The film was both a blessing and a curse for Duvall: It gave her some serious clout as an actress who just exorcised her chops in a film directed by arguably one of the very best directors to ever pull up in front of a camera. But it also set a career bar so incredibly high for the thespian that almost everything else she did post The Shining felt…anticlimactic. After some lean years, Duvall finally picked up stakes and left the wilds of Hollywood for a quieter life. Until now…
According to our Ray Bradbury Theater admirers over at The Hollywood Reporter, actress Shelley Duvall has been coaxed out of retirement for a small yet critical role in director Scott Goldberg’s upcoming horror film The Forest Hills. The film proper will see Duvall going toe-to-toe with such actors as Edward Furlong (A Home of Our Own, American History X), Dee Wallace (E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial, The Howling) and Chiko Mendez (Luke Cage, Lights Out).
The Forest Hills will mark the very first film in which Duvall has beena part of in twenty years and it sounds like a dandy for her return to the land of cellulloid: Duvall will portray the mother of a man (Mendez) who is being tormented by voices and disturbing images after suffering an injury to the head. Furlong will feature as a man called Billy who is on hand pushing for Duvall’s torured son to become a – GULP! – werewolf.
The Forset Hills marks a real return for Shelley Duvall: She can also be seen in the 2022 indie flick Manna from Heaven. Here’s hoping its not another twenty years before we get another smart turn from a very underestimated actress; go Shelley!
