Joan Rivers, the raucous, acid-tongued comedian who crashed the male-dominated realm of late-night talk shows and turned Hollywood red carpets into danger zones for badly dressed celebrities, died Thursday in New York. She was 81.
Her daughter Melissa Rivers said her mother died peacefully at 1:17 p.m., surrounded by family and friends, at Mount Sinai Hospital, where she had been on life support for days.
She had been hospitalized since last week, when she stopped breathing and went into cardiac arrest following a routine throat procedure at a doctor's office. Health officials opened an investigation Thursday into the Yorkville Endoscopy clinic where she had been treated, NBC 4 New York reported.
"My mother’s greatest joy in life was to make people laugh," Melissa Rivers said in her statement Thursday. "Although that is difficult to do right now, I know her final wish would be that we return to laughing soon."
