Julee Cruise, a singer who introduced a memorably ethereal voice to the tasks of the director David Lynch — most famously “Falling,” whose instrumental model was the theme for Mr. Lynch’s cult-favorite tv present, “Twin Peaks” — died on Thursday in Pittsfield, Mass. She was 65.
Her husband, Edward Grinnan, mentioned the trigger was suicide. He mentioned she had struggled with despair in addition to lupus.
Ms. Cruise was constructing a profession off Broadway within the early Eighties when serendipity struck: She met the composer Angelo Badalamenti after they labored on a present collectively.
“I was in this country-and-western musical in the East Village,” she informed The San Francisco Chronicle in 1990. “I was a chorus girl with a big skirt and a big wig, singing way too loud. Angelo was doing the music for the show, and we became friends.”
Just a few years later, Mr. Badalamenti was engaged by Mr. Lynch, who was nonetheless early in his profession, as a vocal coach for Isabella Rossellini within the 1986 Lynch film “Blue Velvet” and ended up writing the rating for that movie as effectively. Mr. Lynch and Mr. Badalamenti had written a tune for the movie that wanted a vocalist.
“Angelo asked me to find someone to sing a song for the soundtrack called ‘Mysteries of Love,’ but he didn’t like any of the singers I recommended,” she informed The Chronicle. “He wanted dreamy and romantic. I said, ‘Let me do it.’”
Ms. Cruise had all the time thought of herself as “a belter,” as she typically put it (she had as soon as performed Janis Joplin in a musical revue referred to as “Beehive”), however the voice she got here up with for “Mysteries of Love” was one thing else solely, enigmatic and wispy. It suited that and different Lynch-Badalamenti compositions completely. One author referred to as her type “angel-on-Quaaludes vocals.”
The three had been quickly collaborating on Ms. Cruise’s first album, “Floating Into the Night,” which featured songs by the 2 males, together with “Mysteries of Love” and “Falling.” They additionally collaborated on a stage manufacturing referred to as “Industrial Symphony No. 1,” carried out at the New Music America competition at the Brooklyn Academy of Music in November 1989, with Ms. Cruise performing amid an elaborate set that included an previous automobile.
“Often, Ms. Cruise floated far above the stage, like a prom-gowned, bleached-blond angel,” Jon Pareles wrote in his overview in The New York Times. “At one point, her body plummeted to the floor and was packed into the car’s trunk by helmeted workmen; later, she re-emerged to face a video camera and sing ‘Tell your heart it’s me,’ as 10 chorus girls in gold lamé danced next to her image on television screens.”
National publicity got here the next April when “Twin Peaks” premiered on ABC, with an instrumental model of “Falling” serving as its theme. Ms. Cruise appeared within the pilot and subsequent episodes as a roadhouse singer.
The present rapidly turned the discuss of tv, and in May 1990 it led to an look by Ms. Cruise on “Saturday Night Live.” She wasn’t within the unique lineup, however the controversial comedian Andrew Dice Clay (he referred to as himself “the most vulgar, vicious comic ever to walk the face of the earth”) was the scheduled host, which led to protests from at least one solid member, Nora Dunn, who refused to look in that episode, and brought on the unique musical visitor, Sinead O’Connor, to drop out at the final minute.
Ms. Cruise was one of two acts summoned to interchange her. Mr. Grinnan mentioned in a phone interview that Ms Cruise, who was nonetheless not well-known, was working as a waitress at the time and needed to skip out on her job. But, he famous, she didn’t name in sick.
“She said that she called in famous,” he mentioned.
Though “Twin Peaks” introduced Ms. Cruise huge publicity, Mr. Grinnan mentioned she discovered a stint touring with the B-52’s within the Nineteen Nineties to be notably gratifying. She changed Cindy Wilson, an unique member, when Ms. Wilson took a break from the band.
“It was probably the happiest performing of her life,” Mr. Grinnan mentioned.
Julee Ann Cruise was born on Dec. 1, 1956, in Creston, Iowa, to Wilma and Dr. John Cruise. Her father was a dentist, and her mom was his workplace supervisor.
Ms. Cruise was one thing of a musical prodigy on the French horn, her husband mentioned, and acquired a music diploma within the instrument from Drake University in Iowa. He mentioned she had utilized the delicacy and phrasing of classical French horn to the voice she got here up with for the Lynch tasks.
But as soon as she graduated, she thought that performing and singing could be extra interesting than taking part in in an orchestra. She went to Minneapolis, a superb metropolis for theater, and spent a number of years performing with the Children’s Theater Company there earlier than shifting to New York in about 1983.
After “Twin Peaks,” Ms. Cruise made one other album with Mr. Lynch and Mr. Badalamenti, “The Voice of Love” (1993). She additionally continued performing. Mr. Grinnan mentioned it was her efficiency in an Off Broadway musical, “Return to the Forbidden Planet,” in 1991 that caught the eye of the B-52’s. Mel Gussow, reviewing that present for The Times, mentioned she stood out.
“Only Julee Cruise invigorates the show with musical personality,” he wrote. “Well remembered for her singing on ‘Twin Peaks,’ she is spunky as well as amusing, although the script unwisely keeps her offstage for most of the first act.”
Ms. Cruise later toured with Bobby McFerrin and labored with digital musicians like Marcus Schmickler. In 2003 she fulfilled a longtime objective of performing at the Public Theater in New York when she was solid within the musical “Radiant Baby,” concerning the graffiti artist Keith Haring.
It was a demanding project. As The Times wrote, she performed “Andy Warhol, Haring’s mother, a demonic nurse and a critic who resembles Susan Sontag.”
Which of the roles was most tough, a reporter requested?
“The costume changes,” she mentioned. “I’m the oldest person in this cast.”
Ms. Cruise alternated between properties in Manhattan and the Berkshires. In addition to her husband, whom she married in 1988, she is survived by a sister, Kate Coen.
Ms. Cruise reprised her “Twin Peaks” position in “Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me,” Mr. Lynch’s 1992 movie, and, a quarter-century later, in an episode of Showtime’s reboot of the TV collection. In an interview with The Los Angeles Times in 2017, she mirrored on her lengthy “Twin Peaks” experience.
“It was so much fun to be part of something that just went ba-boom!” she mentioned. “You didn’t know it was going to do that. What a nice surprise life takes you on.”
