He became the youngest person at the time to be accepted into the Juilliard School's Drama Division, where he was a member of Group 10. His high school girlfriend was Mare Winningham. He attended Chatsworth High School with Kevin Spacey. In 1977, Kilmer's younger brother Wesley, who had epilepsy, drowned in a jacuzzi at age 15. Kilmer's grandfather was a gold miner in New Mexico, near the border with Arizona. His mother later married William Bernard Leach in 1970. His parents divorced in 1968 when he was 8 years old. His other ancestry includes Irish, German and Cherokee roots. Kilmer was born December 31, 1959, in Los Angeles, California, the second of three sons to Gladys Swanette ( née Ekstadt 1928–2019) and Eugene Dorris Kilmer (1921–1993). One of the best-paid actors of the 1990s, movies featuring Kilmer have grossed over $3.5 billion at the worldwide box-office. In 2022, Kilmer reprised his role as Iceman, reuniting with Tom Cruise, in Top Gun: Maverick (2022). The film premiered at the Cannes Film Festival to critical acclaim. His struggle was captured in the 2021 documentary entitled Val which documented his career and health issues. In 2020, he published his memoir entitled, I'm Your Huckleberry: A Memoir. He also underwent chemotherapy and two tracheotomies. Since 2015 Kilmer has privately struggled with throat cancer he had a procedure on his trachea that damaged his vocal cords to the point where he could no longer speak.
He continued acting in films such as The Ghost and the Darkness (1996), The Island of Dr. He replaced Michael Keaton portraying Bruce Wayne/Batman in Joel Schumacher's Batman Forever (1995). Kilmer's stardom continued, as he was often cast as the leading man in critically acclaimed films such as the western Tombstone (1993), and the crime dramas True Romance (1993), and Heat (1995). Kilmer gained acclaim for his portrayal of Jim Morrison in Oliver Stone's The Doors (1991). Originally a stage actor, Kilmer found fame after appearances in comedy films, starting with Top Secret! (1984) and Real Genius (1985), as well as the military action film Top Gun (1986) and the fantasy film Willow (1988). Val Edward Kilmer (born December 31, 1959) is an American actor.