{"id":556041,"date":"2026-03-23T20:58:08","date_gmt":"2026-03-23T20:58:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/556041\/"},"modified":"2026-03-23T20:58:08","modified_gmt":"2026-03-23T20:58:08","slug":"superman-and-lenny-star-was-82","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/556041\/","title":{"rendered":"‘Superman’ and ‘Lenny’ Star Was 82"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tValerie Perrine<\/a>, who was Oscar nominated for best actress for her performance in Bob Fosse\u2019s 1974 Lenny Bruce biopic \u201cLenny\u201d and appeared prominently in Richard Donner\u2019s \u201cSuperman<\/a>\u201d films as Lex Luthor\u2019s girlfriend Miss Teschmacher, died Monday in Beverly Hills. She was 81.<\/p>\n

\n\tHer friend Stacey Souther announced her death on Facebook<\/a>, writing \u201cIt is with deep sadness that I share the heartbreaking news that Valerie has passed away. She faced Parkinson\u2019s disease with incredible courage and compassion, never once complaining. She was a true inspiration who lived life to the fullest \u2014 and what a magnificent life it was. The world feels less beautiful without her in it.<\/p>\n

\n\tSouther continued, \u201cPlease consider donating, sharing, and helping spread the word for her funeral GoFundMe. Her final wish is to be laid to rest at Forest Lawn Cemetery, but after more than 15 years of fighting Parkinson\u2019s, her finances are exhausted. Let\u2019s come together to make her last wish a reality\u2014she truly deserves it.\u201d Souther shared a GoFundMe link <\/a>for her burial.<\/p>\n

\n\tPerrine was diagnosed with Parkinson\u2019s disease in 2015.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cLenny\u201d yielded six Oscar nominations, including one for Perrine for best actress. Stand-up comedian Lenny Bruce was a complex, controversial figure, and Fosse\u2019s biopic, starring Dustin Hoffman, inspired a wide range of strong reactions from critics. Roger Ebert said: \u201cThe performances around Hoffman\u2019s are designed primarily to reflect off his. But Valerie Perrine, as Honey, does create her character in an interesting way. The movie stays ambiguous about several aspects of her personality (there\u2019s a menage a trois that\u2019s played for erotic effect while it\u2019s on, and then used to inspire an ambiguous fight). But she does project a certain tarnished sexuality, and she gives us at last a stripper without a heart of gold.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tIn a poignant scene in 1978\u2019s \u201cSuperman,\u201d in which Christopher Reeve\u2019s Man of Steel is lying in a pool, near death because of the Kryptonite with which Lex Luthor has adorned him, Perrine showed that Miss Teschmacher was more than just a beautiful woman that the evil genius keeps around; clearly aching at Superman\u2019s suffering \u2014 but also wanting him to\u00a0stop a nuclear missile (one of two Luthor has set into motion) that\u2019s heading for Hackansack, N.J., where her mother lives \u2014\u00a0she enables his escape.<\/p>\n

\n\tMore recently, Perrine drew acclaim for \u00a0her relatively small role in Nancy Meyers\u2019 huge box office hit \u201cWhat Women Want\u201d ($374 million worldwide, making it the No. 2 romantic comedy of all time). \u00a0In the 2000 film, Mel Gibson\u2019s character supernaturally attains the ability to read the thoughts of women \u2014 and the discoveries he makes are quite disappointing to the self-confident womanizer. Roger Ebert said:\u00a0At work, two assistants (Valerie Perrine and Delta Burke) approve categorically of everything he does, but mind-reading reveals they never think about this.\u201d Variety described this moment in the movie as \u201cone of the film\u2019s funniest gags.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tIn the 2000s Perrine guested on TV series including \u201cJust Shoot Me!\u201d and \u201cThird Watch,\u201d \u00a0and she made her final big-screen appearance in \u201cSilver Skies\u201d (2014).<\/p>\n

\n\tValerie Ritchie Perrine was born\u00a0in Galveston, Texas. Her mother had been a dancer in\u00a0Earl Carroll\u2019s Vanities. The family moved frequently as Perrine\u2019s father was a lieutenant colonel in the U.S. Army who was transferred from post to post.<\/p>\n

\n\tPerrine was featured in\u00a0a pictorial layout in Playboy\u2019s\u00a0May 1972 issue and\u00a0on the cover of the magazine in August 1981. During PBS\u201d 1973 broadcast of Bruce Jay Friedman\u2019s \u201cSteambath\u201d on \u201cHollywood Television Theater,\u201d she became the first actress to purposely appear\u00a0nude on U.S.\u00a0television as \u00a0she\u00a0completely bared her breasts in a scene in which was seen taking a shower from the side. Only a few PBS stations opted\u00a0to air\u00a0the program.<\/p>\n

\n\tAfter some time as a showgirl in Las Vegas, Perrine first appeared onscreen in George Roy Hill\u2019s adaptation of Kurt Vonnegut\u2019s \u201cSlaughterhouse-Five\u201d (1972), playing the beautiful Hollywood starlet\u00a0Montana Wildhack. In 1973 she was the female lead in \u201cThe Last American Hero,\u201d in which Jeff Bridges played a moonshine runner-turned-NASCAR driver, and Perrine played a girl in whom Bridges is interested but \u201cwho turns out to be a race track groupie providing her own prizes to the winners,\u201d according to the Cleveland Press\u2019 Tony Mastroianni.<\/p>\n

\n\tAfter appearing in \u201cLenny\u201d in 1974, she starred with Rod Steiger in Arthur Hiller\u2019s \u00a0\u201cW.C. Fields and Me\u201d (1976) and with Terence Hill in action road picture \u201cMr. Billion\u201d (1977) before taking on the mantle of Miss Teschmacher for the first two \u201cSuperman\u201d films starring Christopher Reeve. She\u00a0appeared in Sydney Pollack\u2019s\u00a0Robert Redford-Jane Fonda vehicle \u201cThe Electric Horseman\u201d (1979), and the New York Times said: \u201cMr. Pollack has also cast the supporting roles with care, especially Willie Nelson, the country-music star, as Sonny\u2019s laid-back rodeo pal; Valerie Perrine as Sonny\u2019s sweet but not infinitely patient former wife, and John Saxon as the amusingly ruthless head of Amco.\u201d The actress also appeared with the Village People in the 1980 musical comedy \u201cCan\u2019t Stop the Music.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tAfter \u201cSuperman II,\u201d she starred as the wife of Jack Nicholson\u2019s disaffected Border Patrol agent in Tony Richardson\u2019s \u201cThe Border\u201d (1982) and starred opposite Michael Caine\u00a0in the adventure comedy \u201cWater\u201d (1985).<\/p>\n

\n\tThe actress tried series regular television with\u00a0\u201cLeo & Liz in Beverly Hills\u201d (1986), in which she starred opposite Harvey Korman, but the CBS show, co-created by Steve Martin, lasted only six episodes.<\/p>\n

\n\tIn 1987 feature comedy \u201cMaid to Order,\u201d Ally Sheedy starred as a young brat who, by means of a fairy godmother teaching her a life lesson, is suddenly alone and homeless and finally gets a job as a domestic for a couple. Roger Ebert said: \u201cThis couple, played by Valerie Perrine and the late Dick Shawn, are the highlight of the movie. They\u2019re the kind of people Mel Brooks was thinking about when he spoke of \u2018rising below vulgarity.\u2019 They\u2019re simpleminded and silly, ridiculously in love with material possessions and even more in love with each other.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tThe actress starred with Elizabeth Taylor and Mark Harmon in a 1989 TV movie adaptation of Tennessee Williams\u2019 \u201cSweet Bird of \u00a0Youth\u201d directed by Nicolas Roeg.<\/p>\n

\n\tDuring the \u201990s Perrine guested on series including \u201cNorthern Exposure,\u201d \u201cHomicide: Life on the Street,\u201d \u201cER,\u201d \u201cNash Bridges\u201d and \u201cThe Practice.\u201d\u00a0She also appeared on daytime soap \u201cAs the World Turns\u201d as\u00a0Dolores Pierce in 1998-1999 before scoring the role in Nancy Meyers\u2019 extraordinarily successful 2000 comedy \u201cWhat Women Want.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Valerie Perrine, who was Oscar nominated for best actress for her performance in Bob Fosse\u2019s 1974 Lenny Bruce…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":556042,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[49,48,361,75,5769,215470],"class_list":["post-556041","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-celebrities","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-celebrities","tag-entertainment","tag-superman","tag-valerie-perrine"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/556041","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=556041"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/556041\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/556042"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=556041"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=556041"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=556041"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}