Last month, we reported that the former Home Alone star Catherine O’Hara had died at the age of 71. Now, her cause of death has finally been revealed.
O’Hara’s Cause Of Death
A death certificate obtained by Fox News has shown that O’Hara died of a pulmonary embolism. Rectal cancer has been listed as her underlying cause of death.
The Los Angeles Fire Department has confirmed that first responders were called to O’Hara’s Brentwood home at around 5 a.m. on January 30. She was rushed to the local hospital, where she was listed in serious condition. O’Hara tragically passed away there a few hours later.
“Prolific multi-award-winning actress, writer, and comedian Catherine O’Hara died today at her home in Los Angeles following a brief illness,” her reps said that day.
Two decades before her passing, O’Hara learned that she had dextrocardia situs inversus. This is a rare medical condition during a routine doctor visit.
“He calls us into his office and says, ‘You’re the first one I’ve met!'” O’Hara recalled while appearing on “Virtual Happy Hour” with Kathryn Hall in 2020. “I don’t even know the name, because I don’t want to know the name. Something cardio-inversus. And then dextrocardia and something-inversus.”
“People are going to think I’m so ignorant not to know this, but I kind of don’t want to know,” she added. “Because I didn’t know before that.”
O’Hara leaves behind her husband Bo Welch, who she married in 1992. They met when Welch was a production assistant on her 1988 movie Beetlejuice. O’Hara also leaves behind their two sons Matthew, 32, and Luke, 29.
O’Hara made her last public appearance at the Emmy Awards back in September. At the time, she looked noticeably frail. Check out photos from that appearance below.
O’Hara’s History
O’Hara was born in Toronto, Canada in March of 1954. Once she graduated from high school, she got a job as a waitress at the Second City Theater in Toronto.
O’Hara eventually landed a spot in the theater company herself in 1974. Two years later, O’Hara’s theater scored its own TV show, called Second City Television (and usually abbreviated as SCTV). O’Hara immediately became a staple on the sketch comedy series, which ran until 1984. O’Hara was nominated for five Emmys as part of the writing staff, with her winning one time.
From there, O’Hara launched a successful movie career. In 1988, appeared in the movie Beetlejuice as Delia Deetz, the stepmother of Winona Ryder’s Lydia. Then, in 1990, O’Hara was cast in Home Alone as the harried mom of Macaulay Culkin’s Kevin.
“It’s a perfect movie, isn’t it?” she later said of this classic film in 2024.
“I need to care about the whole thing,” she added of how she chooses projects. “I don’t care to do a great role in a bad project. You want to be part of something good, and that’s how you go.”
O’Hara went on to reprise her role in 1992’s Home Alone 2: Lost in New York.
O’Hara’s Later Work
In 1996, O’Hara appeared in her first Christopher Guest mockumentary Waiting for Guffman. She later star in three more Guest-directed movies: Best in Show (2000), A Mighty Wind (2003) and For Your Consideration (2006).
In 2015, O’Hara teamed up with her old friend Eugene Levy to star in the television show Schitt’s Creek. O’Hara won the Emmy in 2020 for outstanding lead actress in a comedy series for her work on this show.
O’Hara was a true comedy icon, and there will never be another quite like her.
Rest in peace, Catherine O’Hara.