The entertainment world lost an icon today with the unexpected passing of Catherine O’Hara at age 71. A comedy star for the past five decades, the Canadian-born actress was a live wire who invigorated every project in which she participated, and her untimely death comes as a tremendous shock that Hollywood, and her biggest fans, are only just beginning to process.
O’Hara first made a name for herself on the SCTV sketch series alongside future luminaries such as Harold Ramis, Rick Moranis, Eugene Levy (with whom she’d repeatedly partner), and the late John Candy. It wasn’t long before she followed her famous television colleagues to the multiplex, beginning with 1980’s Double Negative.
Collaborations with auteurs like Martin Scorsese, Mike Nichols, and Tim Burton followed, launching a multifaceted career that saw her shine on both the big and small-screen, the latter of which was highlighted by her acclaimed turns on Schitt’s Creek (for which she won her second Emmy) and, most recently, HBO’s The Last of Us and Apple TV’s The Studio.
O’Hara was a comedian whose gifts were boundless, and her legacy lives on via her diverse and hilarious work. In honor of that illustrious and inimitable body of work, we suggest celebrating her by checking out these, her five best film roles.
‘After Hours’ (1985)
One of O’Hara’s maiden movies was a not-insignificant departure from SCTV. After Hours, Martin Scorsese’s madcap nocturnal odyssey about a man named Paul (Griffin Dunne) who struggles to get home in a New York City seemingly intent on thwarting his journey at every turn. As an ice cream truck driver who initially tries to help Paul but winds up leading a mob that’s after him—believing him to be the crook burglarizing the neighborhood—O’Hara made a small but indelible impression, suggesting, even at this early stage, that she was a versatile talent.
‘Beetlejuice’ (1988)
Following her supporting contribution to 1986’s Heartburn—a Mike Nichols-helmed, Nora Ephron-penned drama starring Meryl Streep and Jack Nicholson—O’Hara proved a scene-stealing wonder in Tim Burton’s 1986 gothic horrorshow Beetlejuice. A snooty upper-crust laugh riot, the actress’ Deelia Deetz is the perfect unlikable foil to Alec Baldwin and Geena Davis’ ghosts (whose residence she’s taken over) as well as her goth daughter Lydia (Winona Ryder). Her performance is a zany comic masterpiece and, unsurprisingly, led to future projects with Burton.
‘Home Alone’ (1990)
For all her wacko output, O’Hara will likely forever be best remembered as the mother of Macaulay Culkin’s Kevin McCallister in Home Alone—an iconic role that allowed her to emphasize the sweetness that always underscored her off-the-wall silliness. Playing a harried woman determined to make it home to the son she’s accidentally left behind during the holidays, O’Hara turns a nominal villain into a stirring (and funny) figure of maternal devotion, and brings balance and heart to John Hughes’ enduring classic.
‘Waiting for Guffman’ (1996)
Reuniting with her SCTV compatriot Eugene Levy in the first of their numerous mockumentaries with Christopher Guest, Waiting for Guffman features O’Hara as a small-town travel agent who, along with her husband (Fred Willard), is hired to be the lead of a community theater production spearheaded by Guest’s bonkers director Corky St. Clair. Surrounded by a peerless cast that includes Bob Balaban, Parker Posey, Michael Hitchcock, and Brian Doyle-Murray, O’Hara is an endearingly eccentric delight—and as with her colleagues, her performance is all the more impressive for being largely improvised.
‘Best in Show’ (2000)
Building off the template he’d honed with Waiting for Guffman, Guest returned to the faux-non-fiction well in 2000 with Best in Show—the finest of his mockumentaries, thanks, in part, to O’Hara, whose rapport with Levy is so natural and charmingly loopy that it’s no wonder they’d go on to strike TV gold with Schitt’s Creek. The actress’ competitive dog owner Cookie Fleck is an inspired comic creation, and her mixture of offbeat weirdness and earnest compassion and ambition elevates this laugh-out-loud classic—and, also, epitomizes the unerringly nuanced, charismatic, and winning artistry of this beloved (and gone-too-soon) star.
