Actress Betsy Palmer Dies at 88

The actress was best known for her role of Mrs. Voorhees in the classic horror film “Friday the 13th”

Betsy Palmer, who was best known for playing Jason Voorhees’ mother in 1980 classic “Friday the 13th”, died at the age of 88.

The actress died on Friday at a hospice care center in Connecticut but the news surfaced on Sunday after his long-time manager Bred Lemack told it to the media.

Betsy Palmer career spanned more than 60 years. She started off in 1950s as the panelist of shows like “Studio One”, “The Today Show” and “I’ve Got a Secret” and went on to act in numerous television series such as “Philco Television Playhouse”, “Number 96” on NBC in which she played Maureen Galloway and “Knots Landing” on CBS, playing Aunt Virginia “Ginny” Bullock from 1989 to 1990.

Palmer appeared in a dozen of movies but she was probably best remembered as Mrs. Voorhees, a camp cook-turned murderer and the mother of Jason Voorhees, a stalker and killer who was drowned in the lake and was frequently appeared in the Friday the 13th series.

Palmer originally did not like the script of the film, in fact, called it a “piece of junk”. She did not want to act in a horror flick as well but accepted the role because she needed money to buy a car.

My agent called and said. “How would you like to be in a movie? Palmer told in an interview how she got into the Friday the 13th. “I said, Great, I haven’t done a movie since the 1960s. He said, It’s 10 days work, they’ll pay you $1,000 a day. I said, ‘Great, I want to buy a car. It’ll just cover the car. He said, ‘There is a drawback. It’s a horror film. I said, Oh, no.”

Her last film was Bell Witch: The Movie where she gave the voice to Bell Witch.

Betsy Palmer also made stage appearances. Her credits on stage included, “Roar Like a Dove, “Cactus Flower”, “A Doll’s House”, “Eccentricities of a Nightingale” and Countess Dracula.”

Palmer left behind a daughter Melissa Merendino.