5 essential Catherine O’Hara performances, from ‘Schitt’s Creek’ to ‘Home Alone’

Catherine O’Hara, best known for her roles in Schitt’s Creek, Beetlejuice and Home Alone, died Friday after a brief illness.

While O’Hara was a cast member on Saturday Night Live for just one week, she got her big break as an original cast member of the Canadian sketch comedy show Second City Television (or SCTV), alongside Eugene Levy, who’d become a frequent co-star.

Her comedic genius, musical prowess and complete dedication to the characters she portrayed appeared in dozens of films and television shows over her over 50-year acting career, from voicing the speaking and singing roles of Sally and Shock in The Nightmare Before Christmas, to the inexplicable dialect created for Moira Rose on Schitt’s Creek, to the sobering performance of a therapist practicing in a post apocalyptic world in The Last of Us.

Here are some of those essential O’Hara performances that highlighted her comedic genius and made her so iconic.

‘Perma-Lacque’ commercial (SCTV)

O’Hara had her hand in many roles across her eight-year long tenure in SCTV. One that still makes the rounds on social media is “the woman with indestructible hair.” Note the utter seriousness in her performance that sells the joke!

Herb Ertlinger’s fruit wine commercial (Schitt’s Creek)

A favorite O’Hara moment as her beloved Schitt’s Creek character Moira Rose is when she delivers a performance of "craftsmanship" and “quality” for a TV commercial on fruit wine. Has anyone ever mispronounced words so perfectly?

“Day-O” scene (Beetlejuice)

If you want a master class in lip syncing, look no further than O’Hara as Delia Deetz singing “Day-O,” while possessed at the dinner table in 1988’s Beetlejuice. Her body and lips are in sync, while her eyes give a whole other performance of panic!

O’Hara’s ‘Kevin!’ screams (Home Alone, Home Alone 2: Lost in New York)

It wouldn’t be a complete list without including O’Hara playing one of our favorite 90’s on-screen moms screaming “Kevin!” to the camera. The original is iconic, but we might prefer her delivery in Home Alone 2: Lost in New York. Who else could play a mom who forgets her kid twice and we still love her?!

A mighty kiss (A Mighty Wind)

In the 2003 Christopher Guest mockumentary A Mighty Wind, O’Hara plays Mickey Crabbe, one half of a now broken-up married folk duo. A climax of the film is when Crabbe and Mitch Cohen (played by Eugene Levy) reunite onstage, performing their song “A Kiss at the End of the Rainbow.” As the audience waits with baited breath, they share a poignant kiss. It’s a feel-good moment and a Julia Paskin favorite!