Sally Kellerman, the Oscar and Emmy nominated actor who played Margaret Hot Lips Houlihan in director Robert Altman’s 1970 film MASH, died on Thursday. Kellerman died of heart failure at her home in the Woodland Hills section of Los Angeles, her manager and publicist Alan Eichler said. She was 84.At age 18, Kellerman signed a recording contract with Verve Records, but her first album (Roll with the Feelin', on the Decca label) was not recorded until 1972. A second album, Sally, was released in 2009. Kellerman also contributed songs to the soundtracks for Brewster McCloud (1970), Lost Horizon (1973), Rafferty and the Gold Dust Twins (1975), and Boris and Natasha: The Movie (1992)
Kellerman had a career of more than 60 years in film and television. She played a college professor who was returning student Rodney Dangerfield’s love interest in the 1986 comedy Back to School. And she was a regular in Altman’s films, appearing in 1970′s Brewster McCloud, 1992′s The Player and 1994′s Ready to Wear. She did commercial voiceover work for Hidden Valley Ranch salad dressing, Mercedes-Benz, and Revlon. Kellerman's animation work included The Mouse and His Child (1977), Sesame Street Presents: Follow That Bird (1985), Happily Ever After (1990), Dinosaurs (1992), Unsupervised (2012), and The High Fructose Adventures of Annoying Orange (2013). In April 2013, she released her memoir Read My Lips: Stories of a Hollywood Life, describing her trials and tribulations in the entertainment business.