Val Kilmer, of 'Top Gun' and 'Batman Forever' fame, died at 65

Val Kilmer, a movie actor best remembered for his appearances in blockbusters such as "Top Gun" and "Batman Forever," as well as his iconic portrayal as Doc Holliday in the western "Tombstone," died on Tuesday in Los Angeles. He was 65.

His daughter, Mercedes Kilmer, confirmed that the cause was pneumonia. Kilmer was diagnosed with throat cancer in 2014 but later recovered, she added.

In 2017, he stated that he was recuperating from throat cancer, and People magazine claimed in 2021 that the actor had had a tracheostomy, which permanently destroyed his speaking voice.

"It isn’t easy to talk and be understood," the actor wrote on his website in 2022, discussing the effects of his cancer treatment. "I am improving all the time, but am not able to be out in the world the same way I had become accustomed."

He mainly retired from acting, but he did reprise his part as Tom "Iceman" Kazansky in the enormously popular and long-awaited film "Top Gun: Maverick," which was released in 2022 after a two-year delay.

Val Edward Kilmer was born in Los Angeles on December 31, 1959, and grew up in the Chatsworth area in the city's far northwest, where his neighbors included Roy Rogers and Dale Evans, as well as high school contemporaries Kevin Spacey and Mare Winningham.

Val's father, Eugene, a real estate entrepreneur, and his mother, the former Gladys Ekstadt, separated when he was nine. His younger brother Wesley drowned in a swimming pool in 1977, a tragedy that tormented Mr. Kilmer for years. He attended the Hollywood Professional School before moving to New York, where at the age of 21, he became the youngest student ever accepted into the Julliard School's acting department.

He began his cinematic career with the 1984 comedy "Top Secret!" and appeared in a number of films during the 1980s, including his breakthrough part in 1986's "Top Gun." Kilmer starred in a long string of successful genre-spanning films in the 1990s, including superhero films like 1995's "Batman Forever," in which he played the Dark Knight, and memorable turns in Westerns as Doc Holliday in 1993's "Tombstone," biopics as Jim Morrison in 1991's "The Doors," and crime films as a bank robber in Michael Mann's 1995 masterpiece, "Heat."

Scott put him in his first big-budget picture, "Top Gun" (1986), a testosterone-fueled adventure movie about Navy fighter pilots in training. Val Kilmer portrayed the cool, confident adversary to the film's star, Tom Cruise. It was a part that set the tone for many of Kilmer's subsequent notable appearances as a co-star or member of a famous ensemble. He returned for a brief appearance in the film's 2022 sequel, "Top Gun: Maverick."

He was a member of a robbery group in "Heat" (1995), a modern urban "High Noon"-style story that starred Robert De Niro as the mastermind of a heist and Al Pacino as the detective who tracks him down. He co-starred with Michael Douglas in "The Ghost and the Darkness" (1996), a historical drama about lion hunting in late nineteenth-century Africa. In the film "Pollock" (2000), starring Ed Harris as the painter Jackson Pollock, he played Willem de Kooning, a fellow artist. He portrayed Philip of Macedon, the father of Alexander the Great (Colin Farrell), in Oliver Stone's great epic "Alexander" (2004).

Kilmer stated that, despite his renowned connections with supermodel Cindy Crawford and actress Angelina Jolie, he was sad after divorcing with Daryl Hannah.

“I know I would love her with my whole heart forever and that love has lost none of its strength. I am still in love with Daryl,” he wrote in the memoir, released 19 years after the pair briefly dated in 2001.

Kilmer also dated Cher, whom he described as caring for him following his throat cancer diagnosis and treatment.

Kilmer married actor Joanne Whalley in 1988. The couple divorced, but had two children: son Jack and daughter Mercedes.

In 2021, "Val," a documentary on Kilmer's life, will premiere at the Cannes Film Festival. Kilmer explained that throat cancer made it difficult to talk and be understood.

“I have behaved poorly. I have behaved bravely. I have behaved bizarrely to some. I deny none of this and have no regrets because I have lost and found parts of myself that I never knew existed,” he said toward the end of the film. "And I am blessed."

Kilmer was recovering from throat cancer surgery at the time, so his son, Jack, read the actor's written narration, sounding strikingly like to his father.

In a 2012 interview with The Hollywood Reporter, Mr. Kilmer discussed his decade-plus sabbatical from mainstream Hollywood and admitted that his career trajectory was unorthodox. He stated he had other hobbies and wanted to spend time with his children.

“I don’t have any regrets,” he said, adding: “It’s an adage but it’s kind of true: Once you’re a star, you’re always a star; it’s just what level?”