Entertainment News - Patty Duke

Patty Duke dies at 69; former child star and Academy Award winner

In 1963, actress Patty Duke, 16, accepts the Oscar as supporting actress for her work in "The Miracle Worker" at the annual Academy Awards in Santa Monica. (AP)

Libby Hill Contact Reporter

Patty Duke, former child star and Academy Award winner for her performance as Helen Keller in "The Miracle Worker," has died at 69.

"Anna 'Patty Duke' Pearce passed away this morning March 29, 2016 at 1:20 am. Her cause of death was sepsis from a ruptured intestine. She was a wife, a mother, a grandmother, a friend, a mental health advocate and a cultural icon. She will be greatly missed," said a statement released by Duke's manager Tuesday morning.



Duke’s life was marked with both success and struggle, with the earliest years of her life marred by an alcoholic father and a violently depressive mother. From the time she was 8, Duke was raised by talent managers John and Ethel Ross. In her memoir “Call Me Anna,” Duke revealed that the Rosses left her little control over her career or life and began supplying her with alcohol and prescription medication when she was 13.

In 1959, Duke debuted as Helen Keller in the Broadway production of “The Miracle Worker” with Anne Bancroft. The play later was adapted into a film that earned Duke the Academy Award for supporting actress. At the time, Duke was 16 and the youngest person to receive an Oscar in a competitive category.

“It seems like a dream,” she told The Times in 1963 after her Oscar win. “I’m still not sure if happened. When they announced it, I just sat there. I couldn’t move.”

Duke had already won acclaim for the role onstage. She noted that had she grown faster, she might never have had the opportunity to play the role of the young Keller, who could not see, speak or hear after a childhood illness. Duke said a clause in her contract when she took the role in 1959 allowed the producers to cut her if she grew 2 inches.

She said it felt “wonderful to be an Oscar winner — at any age.” She added: “But I don’t think it will change things for me, personally. I’m still just one of the kids.”

Duke debuted on “The Patty Duke Show” in 1963, in which she played both main characters Patricia “Patty” Lane, all-American teenager, and Catherine “Cathy” Lane, her identical cousin from Scotland.

“Patty was very embarrassing to me,” the 66-year-old told The Times in 2013. “They would write those outrageous things for her to do. I would dive in and do it, but I couldn’t wait to get to Cathy. She was sensible, and I’d like to think she was classy.”

The show had a slightly surreal concept and a catchy theme song — “Where Cathy adores a minuet / the Ballet Russes and crêpes suzette / our Patty loves to rock and roll / a hot dog makes her lose control — what a wild duet!” It also boasted such guest stars Sammy Davis Jr., Peter Lawford, Frankie Avalon, Sal Mineo and the British pop duo Chad and Jeremy.

After her successful stint as Patty and Cathy Lane on television, Duke tried to transition back to film with a controversial performance as Neely O’Hara in “Valley of the Dolls,” in which the actress portrayed an alcoholic, drug-addled star.

In addition to being an actress, Duke also was a fierce advocate for mental illness awareness, after her own diagnosis with bipolar disorder in 1982. Duke credited medication and therapy for helping her recovery; she was the first celebrity, via her 1987 autobiography, to make her struggle with bipolar disorder public.

Duke had said she was grateful for her close relationships with son and “The Lord of the Rings” star Sean Astin and his actor brother, Mackenzie Astin, despite the rough childhood to which she subjected them before her illness was diagnosed. Her family called her Anna Banana. After Sean had his own children, she became Nana Anna Banana.

“I had no patience,” she admitted to The Times. “This was not all the time. The thing that these kids had going against them was that you never knew when what was all hunky-dory was going to fly out the window and you were going to be screamed at and berated and either ostracized or made to do some humiliating punishment.”