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UPDATED: Actress Anne Heche Passes Away Following Fiery LA Car Crash

Matt Vespa
Matt Vespa  |  August 12, 2022 10:45 AM

***UPDATE BELOW***

She was reportedly blacklisted for dating Ellen DeGeneres, but actress Anne Heche was still able to find some good acting jobs during her career. There may not have been any Academy Award-winning performances, but any actor would probably tell you that the joy of finding consistent work is good enough. She did that, and not on B-movie predictions. Though some of her roles do fall into that category, not many.

Some of her more iconic roles include her helping Tommy Lee Jones stop a Volcano in Los Angeles, getting murdered by a Psycho Vince Vaughn in the shot-by-shot remake of the Hitchcock classic, and playing a cold-hearted hospital administrator who redeems herself by placing the son of a desperate father, John Q, on the heart transplant list who was initially denied access due to its exorbitant cost. Denzel Washington played the eponymous father. 

Heche went on some insane and, at times, drug-laced adventures with Ed Helms and John C. Reilly in Cedar Rapids. She also played a by-the-book, top White House aide who went along with a grand scheme to deceive the American public from a presidential sex scandal in Wag the Dog, playing alongside greats Robert De Niro, who played a top strategist who manufactures the lie, and Dustin Hoffman, the Hollywood producer who makes this fabrication a reality. What better way to distract the American public from a nasty sex scandal two weeks from Election Day than drum up fake war news about possible hostilities in Albania? Ironically, this film was released when Monica Lewinsky became a household name.

The actress had range, but also a slew of mental health issues and a tumultuous personal life. Those issues seem to have come to a head with her recent car accident on August 5 in Los Angeles. She crashed her blue Mini-Cooper into a house, causing the car to explode. Heche was left in critical condition with severe burns that eventually led to her slipping into a coma and being put on a ventilator. She also suffered a traumatic brain injury that her representatives say is not survivable. She’s expected to pass away (via NBC News):

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Actor Anne Heche suffered an "anoxic" brain injury and is not expected to survive, her spokesperson said Thursday, nearly a week after she crashed her car into a home in Los Angeles.

"It has long been her choice to donate her organs and she is being kept on life support to determine if any are viable," the spokesperson said in a statement on behalf of her friends and family.

On Monday, Heche, 53, was in a coma and in “extreme” condition, her representative said. The spokesperson said the actor was “unconscious, slipping into a coma” following the crash.

Anoxic injuries occur when the brain is cut off from oxygen, causing cell death.

Heche, who was hospitalized at the Grossman Burn Center at West Hills hospital, remained in a coma and in critical condition Thursday, the statement said.

Heche careened into a home in the Mar Vista community of Los Angeles late Friday morning. The home sustained damage from the “heavy fire” sparked by the collision, Brian Humphrey of the Los Angeles Fire Department said.

She had drugs in her system and was being investigated for possibly driving under the influence, police said Thursday.

“In preliminary testing, the blood draw revealed the presence of drugs,” Los Angeles police said in a statement.


Heche was reportedly under the influence of cocaine at the time of the accident. It’s currently being treated as a criminal investigation due to the presence of narcotics. 

***

UPDATE: Heche passed away on August 12. She was 53 years old.