Tommy Lee Jones’ daughter: Details revealed in San Francisco hotel death
Victoria Jones, the only daughter of Academy Award-winning actor Tommy Lee Jones, was reportedly found collapsed and unresponsive in a hallway at San Francisco’s famed Fairmont Hotel early in the morning on New Year’s Day before she was pronounced dead at the scene.
The Daily Mail reported that a guest came upon Victoria Jones lying on the floor in a 14th floor hallway, thought she might be drunk and alerted hotel staff. TMZ, which first reported on Jones’ death, said that San Francisco Fire Department paramedics responded to a report of a medical emergency at the hotel at 2:52 a.m. The emergency was said to be a possible overdose, according to audio of the 911 call, TMZ also reported.
A spokesperson for the San Francisco Police Department also told TMZ that its officers responded to the Nob Hill hotel at 3:14 a.m., and that the case had been turned over to the Medical Examiner for investigation. A cause of death is unknown, though NBC Bay Area reported that foul play is not suspected.
The Daily Mail said it’s not clear if Victoria Jones was staying at the hotel or how she came to be on the 14th floor.
Victoria Jones was the younger of two children that Tommy Lee Jones had with his second wife, Kimberlea Cloughley, to whom he was married from 1981 to 1996, the Daily Mail and People reported. The 79-year-old actor, best known for films such as “The Fugitive,” “JFK,” “No Country for Old Men” and the “Men in Black” franchise, reportedly raised his two children, Victoria and her brother, Austin, 43, away from the Hollywood spotlight, on a cattle ranch he owns in Texas.
As a child and teenager, Victoria Jones seemed interested in following in her father’s footsteps in acting. Her first professional acting role was in her father’s 2002 film “Men in Black II.” She also appeared in an episode of the TV show “One Tree Hill” and had a small role in the 2005 Western film, “The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada,” which marked her father’s directorial debut, according to IMDB.
Tommy Lee Jones spoke proudly of his daughter’s achievements in a 2006 interview with the New Yorker, saying: “She’s a good actress, has her SAG card, speaks impeccable Spanish … . When she was a baby, I told Leticia, her nurse, to speak to her in Spanish.”
But he also joked about having to come down hard on her during the filming of “The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada,” when she was around 14.
“She had to get up at 5 a.m. for her part,” Tommy Lee Jones told the New Yorker. “One morning, she wouldn’t get out of bed. I said, ‘Honey, this is work.’ But she wouldn’t budge. So I fired her. Then, without telling me, the production staff went over and woke her and rushed her out to the set just in time.”
Tommy Lee Jones also told the New Yorker that his daughter inherited his love of polo, which she learned to play on a practice field that he built on property he owns in Florida. “My daughter has been playing polo since she was six, and now she’s entirely fearless,” he said at the time, adding that his current wife, Dawn Laurel-Jones, also “is one of the best women polo players in the country.”
Victoria Jones’ last screen credit was for her father’s 2014 film, “The Homesman.” It’s not known if Victoria Jones pursued another profession.
Online court records show that Victoria Jones had two active misdemeanor cases in Napa County, one involving allegations of obstructing a peace officer, being under the influence of a controlled substance, and possession of a narcotic controlled substance. The other involved misdemeanor domestic battery. The New York Post also reported that she was arrested in Santa Cruz County in May though that couldn’t be immediately verified.
