Jocelyn Wildenstein, the Swiss socialite nicknamed "Catwoman" after a seemingly endless series of plastic surgeries, has died. "Her partner Lloyd Klein is pained to announce the death of Jocelyne Wildenstein in Paris," Klein told AFP in a statement, using an alternate spelling of her first name. The statement noted that Wildenstein was 79 at the time of her Tuesday death (most outlets are reporting she was actually 84 years old). Klein told AFP that Wildenstein died of a pulmonary embolism, per Page Six.
"Because of her phlebitis [vein inflammation], the legs were very, very swollen, and the blood was blocked, and there was no oxygen in the brain," Klein tells People of what caused blood clots to travel to her lungs. He says he and Wildenstein were taking a nap on New Year's Eve when she died in her sleep. "I said, 'Jocelyn, we have to wake up, we have to get dressed,' and she was cold and she was dead," he notes. Klein calls Wildenstein's death "extremely sad" and adds that she'd seemed to be in "impeccable" health and "at the top of her game" in recent days.
Wildenstein, nee Jocelyne Perisset, first catapulted into headlines in the late '90s, when the mother of two split from her husband, billionaire art dealer Alec Wildenstein. Tabloids dubbed her "Catwoman" and "Bride of Wildenstein" due to the appearance of her face, which had undergone extensive cosmetic surgery during the marriage, per People. She received a $2.5 billion payout in the divorce settlement, as well as $100 million annually, but she declared bankruptcy in 2018 and said the family of her ex, who'd died a decade earlier, had cut her off.
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Wildenstein often played it murky when it came to talking about her artificial enhancements, claiming her cat-shaped eyes were genetic or that her facial features simply looked different depending on how she wore her hair on certain days, per CNN. She was said to have had a documentary and a reality show in the works, with TMZ reporting that the reality show had already been filmed and was just being shopped around for a home. Ultimately, though, Wildenstein seems to have been at peace with her life. "I have nothing to prove," she told Paper in 2018, per CNN. "In the end, I don't care." (More Jocelyn Wildenstein stories.)
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