Simply put, Catherine O’Hara was one of the funniest people in the world.
However, it took too long for the world to notice the genius manga artist who had been staring at them for decades.
The Toronto-born actress died Friday at the age of 71 in Los Angeles after a short illness. She is truly one of a kind and has been making us laugh for over 50 years.
For many, O’Hara will always be Kevin McCallister’s frantic mother Kate in the 1990 film Home Alone. The film remains popular worldwide, and watching it has become a Christmas Eve tradition in most parts of Poland.
And, of course, she played the artsy Manhattanite stepmother Delia in 1988’s Beetlejuice.
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In both roles, she was a very serious woman, but her irrepressible cheerfulness broke through their steely façade. She wasn’t Macaulay Culkin or Michael Keaton, she was her “Kevin!” and “DAY-O!” These are two of the most memorable movie scenes of the late 20th century.
“I think everyone is born with a sense of humor, but sadly, sometimes you can break out of it in your life, and sometimes you can be lucky enough to grow in it,” she told The New Yorker.
Since his early days on stage in Toronto, O’Hara has been surrounded by comedy greats.
She got her start north of the border in the legendary 1972 musical Godspell, alongside an illustrious list of future stars including Martin Short, Eugene Levy, Dave Thomas, Gilda Radner, Victor Garber, Andrea Martin, and Paul Shaffer.
Radner, who had dated O’Hara’s older brother Mark after performing with them at the Global Village Theater, introduced the young actress to the Second City comedy troupe.
O’Hara, Radnor, Short, Thomas, Martin and Levy, with whom she would work many times, went to Toronto’s Second City in 1974, where they were joined by John Candy and Rick Moranis. O’Hara served as Radner’s understudy until her friend left for “Saturday Night Live.”
As for the rest, that live connected to “SCTV” instead. It’s a pre-taped sketch show that is Canada’s answer to “SNL.” It’s just crazier.
Like O’Hara, “SCTV” was uncompromising and took its time building a cult fan base that exploded in 1981.
She played all kinds of eccentric roles in the then-comedy-punk-rock series.
“My mantra in improvisation was to play like crazy when in doubt,” she said. “Because I didn’t have to excuse what came out of my mouth. I didn’t have to make sense.”
O’Hara played Katharine Hepburn and June Cleaver in “Leave It to Beaver.” She once became Lucille Ball, belting out Christmas songs to the tune of “Mame.”
“SCTV,” which was ultimately filmed in Edmonton, Alberta, had the potential to be much stranger than 30 Rock’s “SNL.”
Her talent for playing larger-than-life, outlandish characters was largely erased when she moved into mainstream Hollywood in the 1980s.
But the experience on “Beetlejuice” gave her a family. She married production designer Bo Welch in 1992 and had two children, sons Matthew and Luke.
In 1996, her wild side exploded back in the mockumentary Waiting for Guffman, the first of four great collaborations between O’Hara and writer/director Christopher Guest.
In the small-town musical send-off, she plays Sheila Albertson, an overconfident travel agent who has never left her small community in Blaine, Missouri, and always appears in local theater shows.
Things got even more sinister in 2000’s Best in Show, in which she starred as Cookie Fleck, the wife of Jerry Levy, a terrier-loving nymphomaniac on his way to a Mayflower Kennel Club dog show.
“She had dozens of boyfriends,” Jerry says.
“Hundreds,” Cookie replies.
Guest’s folk music satire 2003’s “A Mighty Wind” reunited O’Hara and Levy as Mitch and Mickey, a former singing and romantic duo reunited after years apart.
The good friends and actors performed their sweet nominated song “Kiss at the End of the Rainbow” at the 2004 Oscar Awards. If you watch it now, you’ll probably cry by the end.
O’Hara and Guest last worked together in 2006’s For Your Consideration, the story of a criminally unrecognized actress named Marilyn Hack who transforms into a monster when her small indie film Home for Purpose becomes an online Oscar buzz.
Although she played many egomaniacs, O’Hara herself was no diva. She was a beloved performer and continued to humbly return to breathtakingly entertaining ensembles throughout her career.
Her last role was in Apple’s critically acclaimed “The Studio,” playing a reprehensible and foul-mouthed Hollywood executive.
And unlike poor Marilyn Hack, her longtime fans were overjoyed when O’Hara, along with Levy, finally won the 2020 Emmy Award for Best Acting for her role as the unattainable Moira Rose on the sitcom Schitt’s Creek.
Accepting the trophy for Best Actress in a Comedy Series, she thanked Levy and her son, Dan, for writing women who “are able to express themselves in their outrageous ways.”
How lucky the great Catherine O’Hara was to get a half-century of being her own outrageous self.
