Kirstie Alley, of ‘Cheers’ Fame, Dies at Age 71

Her children announced the news via their mother’s social media accounts, saying she ‘passed away after a battle with cancer, only recently discovered’.

Actress Kirstie Alley has died aged 71. Picture: Getty Images

Kirstie Alley, the film and television star comic who became a household name following her roles in Cheers, Veronica’s Closet and Look Who’s Talking, has died after a short illness. She was 71.

Alley’s death was confirmed on Monday in a statement by her two children, William Stevenson and Lillie Stevenson, who said their mother had died after a short battle with cancer that had only recently been detected.

“She was surrounded by her closest family and fought with great strength ... As iconic as she was on screen, she was an even more amazing mother and grandmother,” her children posted to social media.

Alley was described as an ‘incredible, fierce and loving mother’.

Alley, pictured in 2013. Picture: Getty Images

Born in Kansas in 1951, Alley made her film debut at the age of 31 in Star Trek II following several leading roles in One More Chance, Blind Date and Runaway.

Her career breakout came in the late 1980s when she joined the cast of the popular US sitcom Cheers, playing the role of the bar’s manager Rebecca Howe, starring alongside Ted Danson, Kelsey Grammer and a young Woody Harrelson.

It became the role she would be most closely associated with throughout her career, earning her a Golden Globe and an Emmy. Alley won a second Emmy in 1994 for her performance as a mother of an autistic child in the made-for-television film, David’s Mother.

In the early 2000s, amid extensive coverage of her rapid weight gain, Alley transitioned into reality television, starring in the show Fat Actress, Kirstie Alley’s Big Life, as well as competing on Dancing with the Stars and The Masked Singer.

Alley married her childhood sweetheart, Bob Alley, and divorced three years later in 1977. Shortly after their divorce, Alley became a Scientologist while struggling with a cocaine addiction; she later credited the church’s drug rehabilitation program for her return to sobriety.

In 1983, she married actor Parker Stevenson and they adopted their two children, William and Lillie. They divorced in 1997.

Alley with Steve Guttenberg in the 1996 film It Takes Two.

Alley became a vocal supporter of Donald Trump during the 2016 presidential campaign, claiming she had been “blackballed” in Hollywood due to her politics.

“You can be cooking meth and sleeping with hookers, as long as, apparently, you didn’t vote for Trump,” she told Fox News last year. Following the capital riots of January 6, 2021, Alley reiterated her support for Trump, as well as describing the protesters as “patriots”.

On Monday, the star was remembered by her long time colleague and friend, Ted Danson, as a brilliant actress and comic.

“Her ability to play a woman on the verge of a nervous breakdown was both moving and hysterically funny,” he told Deadline Hollywood.

Alley’s ex-husband, Parker Stevenson, wrote: “I am so grateful for our years together, and for the two incredibly beautiful children and now grandchildren that we have. You will be missed.”

Alley is survived by her two children and three grandchildren.