died over the weekend after a devastating single car crash in which she sustained a severe brain injury. She was 53 year old.
RIP.While her personal life was often the subject of tabloids (she famously dated Ellen Degeneres in the late ’90s), Heche remained a compelling and enigmatic screen presence who refused to be boxed in by genre or any one “type” of role.
She could be hilarious, heartbreaking, horrifying—sometimes all in the matter of one scene.Perhaps there’s no better example of her boundless skill than the year 1997, a major breakout moment for the star.After her start in TV soap Another World and a successful run of indies (Walking And Talking chief among them—it’s a must watch), Heche had an impressive blockbuster run that year which saw her pull off gritty crime drama (Donnie Brasco), political satire (Wag The Dog), and disaster epic (Volcano).But for our purposes, we have to talk about her small but unforgettable turn in that fall’s horror classic I Know What You Did Last Summer.Written by gay Scream scribe Kevin Williamson, the slasher is remembered for taking the hottest young stars of the moment (Jennifer Love Hewitt, Freddie Prinze Jr., Sarah Michelle Gellar, Ryan Phillippe) and having them run for their lives from a hook-handed fisherman.But I Know What You Did Last Summer also gave Heche a juicy supporting role, one that left an indelible impression in just a few minutes of screen time.She played Missy Egan, the sister of the local man that Julie (Hewitt), Helen (Gellar), and their friends believe they accidentally killed the year prior.