Death of Gilda Radner



Gilda Radner was an American actress and comedian best known for being one of the original cast members (Not Ready for Prime Time Players) of Saturday Night Live during its first 5 seasons from 1975 to 1980, before she left the show to pursue other endeavors.

Around the mid-late 1980s, Radner was diagnosed with ovarian cancer, and she suffered extreme physical and emotional pain as a chemotherapy patient. She was later thought to go into remission, and wrote a memoir about her struggles with the illness titled It's Always Something, named after a catchphrase that Radner's character Roseanne Roseannadanna often said during the Weekend Update segments of SNL.

After a successful guest appearance on It's Garry Shandling's Show in 1988, she wanted to host an episode of SNL for its 13th season in March of that year, but it was cancelled due to a writers' strike. Radner thought about hosting the show in the following year, but by then, doctors have discovered that her cancerous cells haven't been completely removed and have spread to the other areas of her body. Radner was admitted for a CAT scan to Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, California, where she was given a sedative and passed into a coma on May 17, 1989, before dying three days later without regaining consciousness, with her second husband Gene Wilder by her side.

Gilda Radner was the second former SNL cast member to pass away after John Belushi and the first female cast member of the show to pass away. The season 14 finale that aired on the day of Radner's death was dedicated to her, with the episode's host, Steve Martin, playing a sketch featuring him and Radner instead of his planned monologue.

May she rest in peace.