Disaster Actress Daveigh Chase Dead at 35 - Starred in 'The Ring,' Voiced Lilo in 'Lilo & Stitch'

Actress Daveigh Chase Dead at 35​

By TMZ Staff
Published June 17, 2026 9:53 AM PDT | Updated June 17, 2026 12:27 PM PDT


Daveigh Chase -- the former child actress -- is dead ... TMZ has learned.

The actress' boyfriend, Roy Hernandez, tells TMZ ... Daveigh died Tuesday from meningitis and an infection in her blood, which caused her to have septic issues and led to her body shutting down.



Alamy
We're told Daveigh had been admitted to a hospital in Los Angeles earlier this month because of malnutrition.

Daveigh caught her big break in Hollywood early on ... voicing Lilo in the hit Disney film "Lilo & Stitch" back in 2002 and the follow-up TV show. She also voiced Chihiro Ogino in the American dub of "Spirited Away."


Horror movie fans will recognize her from her haunting performance as Samara Morgan ... the main antagonist in the hit 2002 film "The Ring" ... for which she won an MTV Movie Award for Best Villain.

Beginning in 2006, Daveigh earned a recurring role in the HBO series "Big Love" ... which follows a fundamentalist, polygamist Mormon family. She played Rhonda Volmer in 32 episodes of the hit show during its five-season run.


Her other credits include ... "Donnie Darko," "Beethoven's 5th," "Sabrina the Teenage Witch," "ER," "Mercy," and more.

Daveigh had numerous run-ins with the law over the years, which we've covered.


Play video content
NOVEMBER 2012

THE LAST TIME WE SAW HER
Video: The Last Time We Saw Daveigh Chase
TMZ.com
We last caught up with Daveigh in 2012 ... when we asked her about her makeup habits -- and she told us about her latest project.

Daveigh was 35.

RIP

 

[BobsSpergers]

Is there any child actor that doesn't become a mess?
Also explains dying from septic shock.
People in a first world country just ignoring an infection is wild

A fair amount of modern a-listers were c to d-list child stars in the 80s and 90s. Reese Witherspoon and Scarlett Johansson have been acting since they were kids but they weren't in anything big. Natalie Portman, Christian Bale, Christina Ricci, Elijah Wood, even Leo DiCaprio are all former child stars. Also I always forget how many movies Kirsten Dunst did as a child. They all seem to be doing okay...I guess it depends on the parents. If your mom and dad are naive or money hungry you're fucked.

 

[Scarlett Johansson]

It does depend on the parent. Its very sad about her. I heard they're blaming her boyfriend.

 

[Would]

The actress' boyfriend, Roy Hernandez

Shit burner, empathy gone.

Did other child/teenage stars like Melissa Joan Hart and Joey Lawrence came out of child stardom well as well?

If by well you mean more or less well-adjusted? Then I guess you could add Mara Wilson and Alex Vincent in there too.
If by well you mean they aren't proggies/commies, then probably not.

 

[Comandante Marcos]

With hardcore female druggies, they tend to call their dealer their "boyfriend", and there are shitloads of taconiggers in Cali who deal dope. A lot of the dealers in SF and LA are from Honduras. So yeah, nothing surprising about a female addict "dating" her dealer.

I read that she had been addicted off and on since the age of 13. Starting that young means your entire body develops around drugs, it's nearly as bad as pregger bitches doing dope while their kid is still inside. It is literally impossible to quit in that circumstance. There is so much dope and twisted sex swirling around Hollywood that it's basically a third world country, along with the rest of the Los Angeles Basin. Only real cure is a Dresden treatment.

 

[Ser Prize]

She's married with kids and says Christian things that trigger the progtards, she did better than ok imo

E: Lilo and stitch art style is highly visually offensive and I don't even know how that happened

Also a registered republican.

 

[Sneed's Feed And Seed]

the guy who played Screech on Saved by The Bell

Wasn't Dustin wrestling or into boxing or something? I seem to remember him on "Celebrity ______________"

 

[Sneed's Feed And Seed]

He's apparently a trained martial arts practitioner with a black belt in Brazilian jiu-jitsu. [snip] In 2021, following an uptick in antisemitic attacks, Lipnicki teamed up with security firm Magen Am to escort Jews to synagogues.

No wonder he trains BJJ; look whom he hangs out with. Natural position for a child star too, just before the Diddy Party really begins.

 

[XYZpdq Jr.]

Wasn't Dustin wrestling or into boxing or something? I seem to remember him on "Celebrity ______________"

yeah he was on celeb fights against the guy who played Horshack on Kotter
it was pretty funny the announcer was like
THE GUY WHO PLAYED SCREECH IS A [WHATEVER] BELT IN [SOMETHING FU]
THE GUY WHO PLAYED HORSHACK .... WRITES CHILDRENS BOOKS

 

[Scarlett Johansson]

yeah he was on celeb fights against the guy who played Horshack on Kotter
it was pretty funny the announcer was like
THE GUY WHO PLAYED SCREECH IS A [WHATEVER] BELT IN [SOMETHING FU]
THE GUY WHO PLAYED HORSHACK .... WRITES CHILDRENS BOOKS

Wasn't that the same series that had like....Tonya Harding

Looking back on it, Daveigh barely did anything after what....Ring 2 in 2005? Or at least Lilo in anything L&S?

 

[Loris Yeltsin]

Is there any child actor that doesn't become a mess?

Depends on your definition.

:edit:
More seriously, I just googled the two kids from Jurassic Park, Ariana Richards and Joseph Mazello, and they both appear to live normal lives.

 

[Fata v3]

Jason Bateman seems pretty solid. He's a really good actor too.

Bateman was a mess in his 20s, heavily into the party scene (coke) and being in a bunch of failures and projects stuck at pilot stages.
Without cleaning himself up and landing Arrested Development, giving him a comeback he would probably be a footnote right now.

 

[Super-Chevy454]

yeah he was on celeb fights against the guy who played Horshack on Kotter
it was pretty funny the announcer was like
THE GUY WHO PLAYED SCREECH IS A [WHATEVER] BELT IN [SOMETHING FU]
THE GUY WHO PLAYED HORSHACK .... WRITES CHILDRENS BOOKS

Speaking of the devil, I saw that old clip of Screech and Horshack.

 

[VargReallyDidNothingWrong]

Is there any child actor that doesn't become a mess?

No, because one of the stipulations of becoming a child star is that you will be molested by Hollywood execs.

The only one I can think of off the top of my head is maybe Mara Wilson?

TFW too homely even as a child to have been molested

That's why she didn't really have a career post-Matilda.

 

[Kharash]

Hollywood must be purged.

 

[FunPosting101]

Sad to hear of someone dying so young under such unfortunate circumstances, haven't really payed much attention to her acting career so I really don't have much else to say. Other than, of course, that all the sexual predators in Hollywood forcing themselves on children should be [FEDPOST FEDPOST FEDPOST], I mean.

 

[XYZpdq Jr.]

one of the stipulations of becoming a child star is that you will be molested by Hollywood execs.

iirc Shirley Temple had a story of auditioning for the lead of Wizard of Oz, producer soandso brings out the casting couch, she nopes the fuck out, and Judy Garland gets the part instead. Then she played Dorothy

 

[VargReallyDidNothingWrong]

iirc Shirley Temple had a story of auditioning for the lead of Wizard of Oz, producer soandso brings out the casting couch, she nopes the fuck out, and Judy Garland gets the part instead. Then she played Dorothy

Hollywood execs molesting kids has apparently been an open secret since its inception, its been a plot point in fiction as far back as hardboiled detective novels in the 1930s.

 

[Kari Kamiya]

iirc Shirley Temple had a story of auditioning for the lead of Wizard of Oz, producer soandso brings out the casting couch, she nopes the fuck out, and Judy Garland gets the part instead. Then she played Dorothy

FYI Shirley was born in 1928, so as a nine-year-old, she was smart to leave that office. It lines up for when she stopped getting roles, too, and was phased out into retirement. Execs talk.

 

[Vyse Inglebard]

iirc Shirley Temple had a story of auditioning for the lead of Wizard of Oz, producer soandso brings out the casting couch, she nopes the fuck out, and Judy Garland gets the part instead. Then she played Dorothy

as a nine-year-old

The wildfires didn't spread far enough.

 

[Scarlett Johansson]

He exposed himself to Shirley but she just laughed and walked out .