What celebrity death(s) hit you the hardest?

For me, probably Cameron Boyce, because he died so young and so unexpectedly and suddenly. He had his whole life ahead of him and his death was a shock to many, including me. Also Betty White, as even though she was 99 and lived a full life, she was just mere days away from celebrating her 100th birthday.

Sean Locke

Setsuko Hara

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Robin Williams and Norm Mcdonald

When someone dies from suicide that's always hard to hear.

I also took Anton Yelchin's death pretty hard. Partly because of his age, partly because of how utterly senseless his death was, and partly because I found him a very warm and charismatic presence on screen and he was in the kind of movies I like. As a lot of the movies I liked him in were thrillers or horror, I have a hard time watching or rewatching them because seeing him afraid or in pain triggers this upsetting train of thought about his last moments.

Natasha Richardson's death has stuck with me because of the mundane circumstances and how quickly they became fatal.

bowie and norm

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Leonard Cohen because his music had been the defining soundtrack to my childhood and adolescence. Tina recently because I had that intense feeling of, ‘Another great voice gone and nothing to replace it’ (debatable, yes, but that’s how I feel). Chris Cornell and Chester Bennington for similar reasons. Finally, Bowie, not that I was ever an obsessive fan, but I still think Lazarus is one of the best late-period songs ever made. Shudder every time I hear it now (and I listen to it a lot) as it’s so haunting.

(Yes, I know this is all music-related, but these hit me the hardest).

Don't really know why, but MCA from the Beastie Boys bothered me a fair deal.



I usually don't dwell too much on when an artist I like dies, whether tragically or naturally, but that one lingers more than most.

Off the top of my head

John Belushi
Natasha Richardson
Burt Reynolds
Kelly Preston
Anne Heche

If I'm being honest, none of them have, or come particularly close, to genuinely shocking me. Surprise, I suppose, particularly for anyone younger, but I try to be really mindful of how little we really know celebrities, and maybe that's led to the proper amount of emotional distance when the news hits.

Closest is Heath Ledger, though, and even that was more just the shock and out-of-nowhereness of it, and not because I felt some kind of connection to him or anything.

This thread is depressing me, I didn't even know some of these actors/performers had died. Gosh, I use to listen to The Beastie Boys and up until a couple of minutes ago I thought all three were still around and kicking it.

What really bums me is after watching a movie I'll often go to IMDB and look up and actor or actress and usually it's an old movie so I know the entire cast is gone...But it's so sad to read how many actors and actresses died so young. I really hate seeing that.

Natasha Richardson was mentioned. I'd never heard of her before I watched The White Countess, that was some years ago...So like usual I went to IMDB and looked at her filmography. That's when I read that she had been killed at an early age in a skiing accident. So sad.

All the tragic stories I've read about classic actors/actresses is the worst part of loving movies.

Mort Sahl

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Stevie Ray Vaughan

We were all stupefied when James Dean died in a stupid senseless auto accident. He was the new King of Hollywood in 1955, and people couldn't believe he was gone.

The great Richard Farnsworth (The Grey Fox; The Two Jakes; The Straight Story) was suffering from partial paralysis and in great pain when he took his Colt .45 and used it the way he knew how.

I completely spaced an obvious one: Marilyn Monroe.
When she died of a heavy barbituate overdose in 1962, it was ruled a suicide, although many have since believed that she was murdered due to the fact that she had become a public embarrassment to the Kennedy's following her affairs with both he and Robert Kennedy; and that she had too much knowledge of Kennedy's secrets, and had become a loose cannon.

She was widely and deeply mourned by the public following the news, although it hadn't been to much of a surprise since it was common knowledge that she was depressed and tended toward heavy medications.

David Bowie and Bill Paxton. If we include non-quite celebrities, then the hardest was James Horner.

John Candy died in March and a month later day after my 12th birthday Kurt Cobain died

After that most deaths were sad but expected but if I had to pick one that really stood out to me was Nikki Grahame.



Nikki was a reality show contestant on the UK version of Big Brother. And while a lot of people play up to the camera's Nikki was just cut different. Her tantrums were legendary, her personality was unique and her humor would just hit you at the right spot.

Part of why her death hurt was that it was building over two or three years. It wasn't drugs but anorexia basically mental illness over time where nobody in her life was able to help her. So that was pretty sad.

Robin Williams and Philip Seymour Hoffman within a span of 6 months was shocking.

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Frank Zappa passing took quite a while to get over. But elated in having seen him live 5 times and own 17 of his albums. A huge fan since '72, as a 14 year old toddler. When the subject of favorite artist comes up, I always respond, "Zappa #1, then a 50 way tie for second".

River Phoenix. I was a big fan of Explorers and Indiana Jones and Last Crusade and it was the first death of a celebrity occurring way before their time I remember becoming aware of. The other one is pretty obvious: Kurt Cobain. It was definitely the last thing I expected to hear about when I turned the radio to the local alternative rock station that day, so I'll likely always remember where I was and what I was doing when it happened.