R.I.P. Jessica Walter

The actor Jessica Walter died at the age of 80 this week. She’s had a long and colorful career. And it’s strange because I can name multiple films she was in at the start of her career, and I can name work she did in the last two decades of her career, but much of it – and I don’t think I’m alone in this regard – is unknown to me.

She started her career in theater before appearing in film and TV in roles in The Group and Bye Bye Braverman, both directed by Sidney Lumet, and Grand Prix, directed by John Frankenheimer. And in one of her biggest early roles, Play Misty for Me in Clint Eastwood’s directorial debut.

Oddly enough in the past month I watched Grand Prix – impressive but had a weak script – and the episode of Columbo from 1974 where she guest starred. And it takes a moment, because of course she’s younger and her voice isn’t quite the same, but it is unmistakably her.

She kept busy and kept working, which I think is often a great compliment for an actor. She won an Emmy along the way. She was a voice actor, did all kinds of parts, but there is something about the fact that she got one of her very best roles in her sixties. Arrested Development has one of the great casts of any TV show that I can think of, and Walter was brilliant.

And of course Archer, where she did some of her best voice work. Plenty of people have referenced what Arrested Development and Archer have in common - Walter’s characters especially - but both shows knew how to write for her in ways that were really exciting to see.

Walter died in her sleep at the age of 80. Which is something I think most of us wish for and wish for the people we know. But I can imagine Walter’s voice calling out about how boring that is and she isn’t going to settle for dying in her sleep and being upstaged by someone else dying slowly and making a big show of people shuffling in to say their goodbyes…

It’s also nice to hear from people that she was as nice and generous as one might hope.