Daveigh Chase shared the touching legacy she hoped to leave behind years before her death

Years before her death, Daveigh Chase told Interview magazine in 2009 that she wanted to change people’s lives. “I just want to make something that I love and people will respect,” she said. “I want to do things that will change someone’s life, not something they’ll forget about tomorrow.” Chase’s path to Hollywood began after her mother was injured in a 1998 Los Angeles car accident and told she couldn’t drive for six months.

Rather than return to Albany, Oregon after their road trip, Chase began pursuing acting at age 8. Her credits included voicing Lilo in Disney’s Lilo & Stitch and Chihiro in Spirited Away, playing Samara in The Ring opposite Naomi Watts, appearing in Donnie Darko as the sister of Jake Gyllenhaal’s title character, and portraying the underage wife of Harry Dean Stanton’s religious leader in HBO’s Big Love.

A man who identified himself as Chase’s boyfriend, Roy Hernandez, told TMZ that the actress passed away on Tuesday at the age of 35 following a bout with meningitis, followed by sepsis.

United States, Los Angeles; Albany, Oregon

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