Janet Vivian Hooks (April 23, 1957 – October 9, 2014) was an American stand-up comedienne, actress, and comedienne who was a cast member of Saturday Night Live from 1986 to 1991.
Some of her notable impressions on SNL include Bette Davis, Ann-Margret, Betty Ford, Nancy Reagan, Sinéad O'Connor, Jodie Foster, Tammy Faye Bakker, Kathie Lee Gifford, Kitty Dukakis, Diane Sawyer, and Hillary Clinton.
Hooks left SNL in 1991 after its 16th season after the tiring of the stress of performing on a live show, although she would make sparse cameos on the show afterwards.
After her retirement from SNL, she became well-known for her roles as Carlene Frazier Dobber on the CBS sitcom Designing Women from 1991 to 1993 and as Miss Leavey in the 1998 comedy-drama film Simon Birch.
She also made several appearances as a special guest throughout the 1990s after her retirement (for dates, see infobox).
Hooks had also worked with director Tim Burton. Besides his quirky sense of film making, Burton was known for reusing actors. Burton had cast Jan Hooks in his 1992 film Batman Returns, where she played a makeup artist who fawned over the Penguin in order to improve his appearance for the media. She was also cast in his earlier 1985 film Pee-Wee's Big Adventure (which was written by and had a cameo with fellow SNL cast mate Phil Hartman), where she had a well-known part as a docent who gives a very long tour of the Alamo "Can you say a-do-be?".
Hooks had been advised by her doctor to stop drinking due to liver damage, but did not attempt to quit. She was diagnosed with leukemia in February 2009, which was treated and went into remission that May. In April 2014, she discovered a bump on her throat. She was given a biopsy and treated at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, but the tumor was unresponsive to chemotherapy and continued to grow. Doctors said the only remaining option was a total laryngectomy, which Hooks declined. She arranged for hospice care and used prescription drugs, wine and cigarettes to manage her pain. She wrote in an email, "...my dependence on wine and cigarettes increases. Oh the irony! The things that soothe you mentally and spiritually destroy you physically. It's so unfair." Her ability to speak, eat and breathe declined. Soon after watching The Late Show with David Letterman with her brother Tom at her home in Woodstock, New York, Hooks succumbed to her throat cancer and died on October 9, 2014, at the age of 57. Her remains were interred in Northview Cemetery in Cedartown, Georgia.
SNL paid tribute to Hooks in the third episode of its 40th season on October 11, 2014. Guest host Bill Hader and Kristen Wiig introduced a tribute in which SNL re-aired a short she had filmed with Phil Hartman in 1988 for SNL's 14th season, titled "Love Is a Dream". This short film was also repeated to honor Hartman following his death in 1998. It is described as "a sweet and melodramatic tribute to the 1948 film The Emperor Waltz", which was directed by Billy Wilder and starred Bing Crosby and Joan Fontaine. The scene casts Hooks as an aging woman who vanishes into her own imagination to sing and share a dance with a long-lost lover (Hartman). Hooks and Hartman appear to lip sync to the original singing voices from the 1948 film. One critic noted that the "Jan Hooks tribute showed that Jan did not need to be funny in order to captivate the attention of her audience."
Characters / Impressions[]
Characters[]
- Anita
- Candy Sweeney
- Marge Keister
- Miss Connie
- Nancy Simmons
- Sherry
Impressions[]
|
|
SNL Career[]
- 1986-1991: Repertory Player
Gallery[]
