Val Kilmer’s kids are sharing a statement in the wake of the Hollywood legend’s Tuesday death.
Mercedes Kilmer, 33, and Jack Kilmer, 29, released a statement to People magazine Thursday mourning the “Top Gun” star’s loss.
“Thank you for honoring our extraordinary father’s memory,” the statement read. “We are so proud of him and honored to see his legacy celebrated. At this time, we would like to grieve privately.” USA TODAY has reached out to reps for Jack Kilmer for comment.
The actor died of pneumonia on Tuesday night in Los Angeles, his daughter told The New York Times and The Associated Press. Kilmer was diagnosed with throat cancer in 2014 but later recovered, she said.
Val Kilmer says he felt ‘grateful rather than humiliated’ in his final years
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The reclusive actor, who retreated from Hollywood’s limelight in recent years, publicly battled the disease for much of the past decade, permanently losing his voice to a tracheotomy, but continuing to act and write.
However, Kilmer was candid during the final years of his life, letting fans inside his legendary career with a revealing 2020 memoir and an intimate 2021 documentary.
The “Tombstone” actor looked back at his personal ups and downs in “Val,” which was culled from hundreds of hours of personal home footage. The documentary was narrated by his son, Jack, after Kilmer lost his natural voice following a yearslong battle with throat cancer that began in 2014.
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Val Kilmer’s treehouse: Inside with USA TODAY, where he spoke about missing his kids
In the summer of 2006, USA TODAY reporter Marco della Cava visited Kilmer on land near Santa Fe, New Mexico, where he was building something new: not a motion picture, but a treehouse.
The iconic actor — who had made his name in “Top Gun,” “The Doors” and many other films — was crafting an elaborate treehouse built high in a stand of old oak trees with material sourced from an old barn on his 6,000-acre spread.
“I’ll fib and say it’s for my kids, but it’s really for me,” he told USA TODAY at the time. “I had a treehouse as a child. So being an adult … well, it’s strangely, weirdly satisfying to sit in a tree.”
Val Kilmer sought refuge in a treehouse. Here’s what happened when I visited.
Mercedes, then 14, and Jack, 11 lived mainly with ex-wife, actress Joanne Whalley and Kilmer had built the treehouse for them, telling USA TODAY that “they haven’t seen this place yet, but I can’t wait, my son’s a monkey. He’ll be up on that tin roof in no time.”
Contributing: Bryan Alexander, Charles Trepany, Patrick Ryan, Marco della Cava
