US actress Patty Duke, who won an Oscar for playing Helen Keller in The Miracle Worker in 1963, has died aged 69. As well as a best supporting actress Oscar, Duke won an Emmy in 1980 for playing Helen Keller’s teacher in a TV movie version.
- Duke also starred in The Patty Duke Show in the 1960s in which she took the roles of “identical” teenage cousins.
- She was the mother of actor Sean Astin, who played the hobbit Sam in the Lord of the Rings trilogy of films.
- Her representative, Mitchell Stubbs, said she died early on Tuesday of sepsis from a ruptured intestine.
- She underwent a heart bypass in 2004.
- Duke was a child star, making her first TV appearance at the age of 12.
- In The Miracle Worker, 16-year-old Duke played blind and deaf girl Helen Keller whose tutor – played by Anne Bancroft – breaks through her isolation and helps her to communicate.
- Among Duke’s other awards included Emmys for My Sweet Charlie in 1970 and Captains and the Kings in 1976.
- She also appeared in the Broadway musical Oklahoma!.
In her autobiography, Duke revealed that in the 1980s she had been diagnosed with bipolar disorder. In later life she became a strong advocate for increasing awareness, funding and research for people with mental illness.
