The Ultimate Superheroines Forum

Very sad news tonight...

YVONNE CRAIG

May 16, 1937 – August 17, 2015

Yvonne Craig passed away at her home in Pacific Palisades, surrounded by her immediate family and comforted by Hospice yesterday night. She died from complications brought about from breast cancer that had metastasized to her liver. She is survived by her husband, Kenneth Aldrich, her sister Meridel Carson and nephews Christopher and Todd Carson. A private service is being planned with no date set at the present time. In lieu of flowers, please make donations to: The Angeles Clinic Foundation by mail at 2001 Santa Monica Blvd, Santa Monica, CA 90404 or by going into their website at http://www.theangelesclinicfoundation.org and following the “Donate” link.

Yvonne Craig began her theatrical career as the youngest member of The Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo and toured for three years when she was accidentally discovered by John Ford’s son Patrick and cast for the lead in the movie The Young Land.

This was quickly followed by many years of film and television including two movies with Elvis Presley (It Happened at the World’s Fair and Kissin Cousins). However, she is probably best known for originating the role as Batgirl in the 1966 TV series of Batman, or for her character “Marta” from the third season of Star Trek in the episode Whom God’s Destroy where she played the well remembered insane green Orion Slave Girl who wanted to kill Captain Kirk.

Over a span of years she appeared as a guest star in many television series, including The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis, The Six Million Dollar Man,Land of the Giants, Mod Squad, Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea, Love American Style, Emergency, and Courtship of Eddie’s Father just to name a few and worked opposite Bing Crosby, Sal Mineo, Don Knotts, George Hamilton, Dwayne Hickman, Dennis Hopper as well as Elvis Presley and James Coburn.

Her next career was that of a real estate broker where she was involved not only in commercial real estate, but also residential income properties for a period of years and still held a real estate license.

Yvonne and her sister, Meridel went into the prepaid phone card business at its inception producing phone cards for charitable events as well as promotional phone cards for the Paramount film Clueless and both Daffy Duck and Bugs Bunny cards for Warner Bros. stores, as well as many charitable organizations for fundraisers.

In 2000, Ms. Craig wrote a book of anecdotal memoirs, From Ballet to the Batcave and Beyond, which covered some of her years in the ballet and her theatrical career.

She actively did voice over work including voicing the role of Grandma in the 2009 Olivia cartoon series for Nickelodeon, and she was recently Executive Producer for the documentary feature film BIRTH.

She and her husband have traveled extensively all over the world, preferring adventure type travel, which has taken them to many countries through the years, and back to Africa seven times.

Yvonne has been involved with social work as well as philanthropic work through the years, and was a public voice to support worker unions and equal pay for woman, as well as supporting free mammograms for women who cannot afford them.

She and her husband have also been advocates of education and long time supporters of education on all levels. They are actively involved with the Phillips Brooks House Association at Harvard, the Harvard Graduate School of Education, two different charter schools, and the Liberal Education for Arts Professionals out of St. Mary’s College of California better known as LEAP. She also volunteered time and tutored and mentored disadvantaged students.

http://www.yvonnecraig.com/news/2015/08 ... -obituary/

RIP Yvonne. You are the reason I'm on this forum now.

RIP Yvonne - your memory will live on.

RIP. I can't believe out of the Terrific Trio, she's the first to go.

RIP!! You were a great addition to Batman.

I had the pleasure of meeting her at a Chiller convention. Supposedly it was her first convention and she told me she was talked into it by her handler and didn't want to come because she didn't know what to expect. But you could tell she was pleasantly surprised that there were these fans who were happy to see her. I just told her how much I loved watching the show as a kid and still watch it to this day and she was genuine and grateful.

R.I.P Batgirl

Sad to hear. Didn't know she had cancer.

http://tweeterhead.com/product/batgirl-maquette/

BTW here's an amazing Maquette of her as Batgirl.

RIP Yvonne :(

Legend.

RIP

I met her at SDCC in 1995. Terrific woman. The world is a bit emptier.

a truly great actress will be solely missed.

RIP :(

We lost a lovely woman. One of my first crushes.

I made a pic for her called Goodbye Yvonne.

RIP....my inspiration...my introduction to all things batman/batgirl and the heroine peril fetish that I have become part of....a sad day for me and us all

She will truly be missed

So graceful, will be missed

My first - and still favourite - superheroine crush.
Holy sadness, Batman

A delight to all who appreciated her beauty, her charm and her joy in her craft, Yvonne will be dearly missed.

All my prayers.

Good night, sweet goddess.

I had just ordered the DVD of Mars Needs Women because she was in it.

It's nice to hear that she had a good life outside of TV and the movies.

Mark Evanier has an amusing article up talking about meeting her at a convention:
http://www.newsfromme.com/2015/08/19/yv ... aig-r-i-p/

Rest in peace.

Very sad to hear. RIP

[album][album][album][album][album] [/album][/album][/album][/album][/album]you will be miss

It's a very sad day, hoping she is at peace now that she is no longer dealing with the pain. She will be missed.

Found this great shot of her. Will be sorely missed. This forum probably wouldn't exist if it wasn't for her and a few others.

Very sad news, sorry to hear. RIP.

RIP Yvonne Craig.

There will never be another. RIP Yvonne. :(

MightyHypnotic @hyponlinemedia wrote: Found this great shot of her. Will be sorely missed. This forum probably wouldn't exist if it wasn't for her and a few others.

Yeah the Beeb used that as the lead for their obit. Its an oddity as its not the proper costume - no Bat symbol, not real gauntlets- but the cowl and cape look legit and she still makes it all work.

And she still looks great in it. A lovely lady.

Super SAD, you were awesome Yvonne!

Wow, so sad. :(

I just realized, from reading the OP that Yvonne was actually 3 years older than my Mom.

I never met her, but I sent her an e-mail once a long time ago and she responded. I was trying to find VHS copies for the old Batman TV show and she was selling real estate at the time, and I somehow dug up her e-mail address online and asked her if she knew where I could buy a copy. She was really nice about it.

Sad to hear of Yvonne Craig's passing. She was a true legend in the superheroine community and played Batgirl like no other, We've lost an icon

Sad news. I can remember watching the old reruns of batman, like when I was only 5 or 6 or so, and so wanting to be her! I attribute my kink of fantasizing about being a superheroine to her. Sad day indeed.

Sad news. Yvonne remains the definitive version of Barbara Gordon / Batgirl. Nobody else came close.

A huge loss. Without question the very woman that made me go kinky - she wore that costume so shockingly well it left little room for anyone else to step into the purple boots as tastefully as she did. R.I.P., Yvonne!

A terrible loss for us all. She had a huge influence on my childhood

"Goodbye, Batgirl."

"You're not going anywhere."

"No, but you are"

<Crash!>

At least she was surrounded by loved ones. May she rest in peace.

RIP, Yvonne. You will always be my favorite version of Batgirl. Thanks for the great memories.

Sad sad sad. When Batman finally hit legit DVD it was noticeable that Yvonne Craig wasn't saying much nor was involved in any of the hoopla, I sorta guessed something had to be wrong alas I was right.
And for an actress with a fifteen year career path in Hollywood she sure worked with a diverse collection of players everyone from Tommy Kirk to Elvis Presley, Oscar Nominee Bruce Dern and James Coburn....
Peace to her ashes succor to her loved ones.

JF

JohnFeer wrote:Sad sad sad. When Batman finally hit legit DVD it was noticeable that Yvonne Craig wasn't saying much nor was involved in any of the hoopla, I sorta guessed something had to be wrong alas I was right.
And for an actress with a fifteen year career path in Hollywood she sure worked with a diverse collection of players everyone from Tommy Kirk to Elvis Presley, Oscar Nominee Bruce Dern and James Coburn....
Peace to her ashes succor to her loved ones.

JF

I didn't think about that. Makes sense now.

tallyho wrote: Yeah the Beeb used that as the lead for their obit. Its an oddity as its not the proper costume - no Bat symbol, not real gauntlets- but the cowl and cape look legit and she still makes it all work.

And she still looks great in it. A lovely lady.

I'm guessing it's from an early costume test. It doesn't appear to be the same shiny fabric used in the final suit.

RIP to the first and best batgirl

I too was saddened to hear the news of Yvonne's passing. I know I'm not alone in having her as my first superheroine crush.

I was heartened, though, because in interviews she seemed like a down-to-earth person with a deprecating sense of humor. When the Michael Keaton Batman movie came out, she said, to demonstrate what happens to retired superheroines, she would have liked to have played a meter maid.

RIP, and my condolences to her family and friends.

Very sad to hear this. RIP Ms. Craig

Seriously badass...

Humorous Red Eye clip lamenting Batgirl.

She was such a big part of so many of us getting into this genre I can't help feel we ought to honour her in some way as a community.
MH, how about we name a part of the board after her or when/if we get around to 2015 Superheroine awards, we have an accolade named after her - 'The YC Award for best Bg
Pic' or portrayal or something? A sort of stand alone one independent of best Sh.
If we do get the awards thing. If not ,like I say maybe name part of the forum, like the BG Gallery.Just feel we ought to do something.