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Maïwenn (sometimes credited as Maïwenn Besco or her birth name Maïwenn Le Besco, born 17 April 1976) is a French actress, film director and screenwriter.
Maïwenn Le Besco was born in Les Lilas, Seine-Saint-Denis, France, a suburban area east of Paris. Maïwenn is of mixed Breton, Vietnamese, French, and Algerian descent. Her Algerian ancestry comes from her maternal grandfather. Maïwenn's mother, Catherine Belkhodja, introduced her to the entertainment industry at a young age, an experience later chronicled by Maïwenn in her one-woman shows Le Pois Chiche (The Chickpea) and I'm an Actress.
Maïwenn starred in several films as a child, then teen, actress--notably as the child version of the lead role played by Isabelle Adjani in the hit film One Deadly Summer (1983).
Following her marriage to director Luc Besson and the birth of their daughter in 1993, Maïwenn interrupted her career for several years. During this period, she only appeared in a supporting part in Besson's Léon: The Professional (1994), in which she was credited as Ouin-Ouin. She also directed the film's making-of. Perhaps Maïwenn's most internationally-seen film role was her appearance as the alien Diva Bazina in Besson's The Fifth Element (1997).
After her breakup with Besson, Maïwenn returned to France. She performed as a standup comedian in an autobiographical one-woman-show, and reentered the movie business after several filmmakers saw her comedy routine in Paris. She appeared in several notable movies, including the horror film High Tension (2003), in which she starred opposite Cécile de France. By the time the film came out in 2003, she had decided she wanted to try directing. In 2006, she directed her first feature film, the semi-autobiographical Pardonnez-moi (2006). According to Maïwenn, after Besson learned she planned to use her own money to produce the film, he told her "You need to immediately stop what you're doing. You're crazy. Nobody puts their own money into a movie." After seeing the film he apologized, saying she was right on this occasion. Her second film was All About Actresses (2009), in which she appears as herself making a documentary. She achieved international recognition when her third film, the social drama Polisse (2011), won the Jury Prize at the 2011 Cannes Film Festival. All three films feature Maïwenn with a camera, stemming from a childhood fascination and her interest in the mise en abyme, the story within a story. Her 2015 film My King (2015) was selected to compete for the Palme d'Or at the 2015 Cannes Film Festival, with Emmanuelle Bercot winning the Best Actress award.
Maïwenn met film director Luc Besson when she was 12 and they began dating when she was 15. In January 1993, at age 16, she gave birth to their daughter Shanna. On the DVD extras for the 1994 film Léon: The Professional, Maïwenn said the film is based on her relationship with Besson. She was 20 at the beginning of filming (early 1996) for The Fifth Element, during which Besson left her for the film's star, Milla Jovovich.
In 2004, Maïwenn had a son, Diego, with Jean-Yves Le Fur, her second ex-husband who is a real estate developer.- Actress
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Brittany Murphy was born Brittany Anne Bertolotti on November 10, 1977 in Atlanta, Georgia, to Sharon Kathleen Murphy and Angelo Joseph Bertolotti. Her father's ancestry is Italian, and her mother is of Irish and Slovak descent. Her father moved the family back to Edison, New Jersey as a native New Yorker and to be closer to other siblings from previous marriages. While dining out one night in the presence of Hollywood royalty, Brittany at the age of 5 approached an adjoining table when Academy Award nominee Burt Reynolds and George Segal were seated. Brittany introduced herself to the Hollywood legends and confidently told them that someday she too would be a star.
She comes from a long line of international musicians and performers with three half-brothers and a sister. Angelo Bertolotti was torn from their tight-knit family as a made-man with the Italian Mafia. The Senior Bertolotti, who coined the nickname of "Britt" for his daughter, was also an entrepreneur and diplomat for organized crime families and one of the first to be subjected to a RICO prosecution. Brittany's interests and well-being were always her father's first goal and objective. To distance his talented daughter from his infamous past, Angelo allowed Sharon to use her maiden name for Brittany's, so that her shining star would not be overshadowed by a father's past, with the couple divorcing thereafter.
Brittany began receiving accolades and applause in regional theater at the early age of 9. At the age of 13, she landed several national commercials. She appeared on television and caught the attention of a personal manager and an agent. Soon, Brittany's mother Sharon turned full-time to being a "Stage Mom" where Angelo provided financial support throughout and their relationship is memorialized with a long and close history in pictures. The hopeful daughter and mother moved to Burbank, CA, where Brittany landed her first television role on Blossom (1990). Hearts and doors opened up for a starring role on Drexell's Class (1991), a short lived TV series.
Brittany's big screen movie debut started with Clueless (1995), where she was co-starring with Alicia Silverstone. Britt soared, demonstrating her musical and artistic talents with dramatic and comedic roles landing a nomination for best leading female performance in the Young Artist Awards for her role in the television film David and Lisa (1998). She garnered tremendous attention for her role in Girl, Interrupted (1999) with Academy Award winner Angelina Jolie. Brittany's band, "Blessed Soul" was growing with her as lead singer and Britt lent her vocal talents to the TV hit, cartoon sensation, King of the Hill (1997) as the voice of Luanne.
She is alleged to have been a witness in the case of the former Department of Homeland Security employee and persecuted whistleblower Julia Davis. According to Davis, Brittany and her fiancée Simon Monjack were then targeted for retaliation that included land and aerial surveillance and a threatened prosecution. Monjack was arrested and detained by the Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). Brittany and Simon confided in Alex Ben Block of the Hollywood Reporter, telling him in an interview that they were under surveillance by helicopters and their telephones have been wiretapped. This information was published by THR posthumously, in an article entitled "The Last Difficult Days of Brittany Murphy."
On December 20, 2009, Brittany Murphy died an untimely death. The LAPD and Los Angeles County Coroner closed the case within one hour, attributing her death to pneumonia and anemia. Five months after Brittany's unexpected demise, her husband Simon Monjack was found dead in the house he shared with Brittany. The chief/spokesperson at the Los Angeles County Dept of Coroner, Craig Harvey, stated that Simon also died from the same exact causes as his wife, namely pneumonia and anemia. Neither Brittany, nor Simon, were given a thorough and complete forensic autopsy for poisons. Brittany's father, Angelo "AJ" Bertolotti, is pursuing the investigation of the true reasons behind Brittany's and Simon's sudden demise, as he believes that the two were murdered. Abnormally high levels of heavy metals and poisons were discovered in Brittany's hair, tested by two other independent forensic labs with famed Pathologist, attorney Cyril Wecht concluded from the appearances, Brittany could have been murdered and should be exhumed. Her father Angelo is preparing court actions to ensure she obtains justice.- Actress
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Andie MacDowell was born Rosalie Anderson MacDowell on April 21, 1958 in Gaffney, South Carolina, to Pauline Johnston (Oswald), a music teacher, and Marion St. Pierre MacDowell, a lumber executive. She was enrolled at Winthrop College located in Rock Hill, South Carolina. Initially discovered by a rep from Wilhelmina Models while on a trip to Los Angeles. Later signed on with Elite Model Management in New York City in 1978. Made debut film appearance in Greystoke: The Legend of Tarzan, Lord of the Apes (1984). Went on to study method acting at the Actors Studio. Had commercial success with performances in Harold Ramis's Groundhog Day (1993) and Mike Newell's Four Weddings and a Funeral (1994).- Nola Martin is known for The Handmaid's Tale (2017), Ginny & Georgia (2021) and Mrs. America (2020). Nola has been married to Ash Tava since 2 April 2022.
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Glenda MacInnis is known for Five Days at Memorial (2022), Good Sam (2022) and American Gods (2017).- Marie Mosquini was a pert, slightly-built comedienne of amazingly prolific output. Between 1917 and 1926, the feisty brunette appeared in close to 200 one- and two-reel shorts, mostly for Hal Roach. She was featured in the initial series of comedies, which propelled Stan Laurel to stardom. Following that, she enjoyed a lengthy run as leading lady to pint-sized Australian comic 'Snub' Pollard, often under the direction of another noted farceur, Charley Chase. Marie also co-starred opposite Will Rogers in Two Wagons: Both Covered (1924), a clever send-up of the classic silent western The Covered Wagon (1923). After striking up a close friendship with fellow actress Bebe Daniels, she was regularly featured in the films of Harold Lloyd, albeit only in minor supporting roles.
Marie Mosquini was born in Los Angeles in December 1899 and educated at a convent school. She spent three years as a stenographer, before deciding to try her luck in Hollywood. The bulk of her work consisted of short comedies, but there were also a handful of feature films for Paramount and Fox, including a rare dramatic role as Madame Gobin in the classic Janet Gaynor romance 7th Heaven (1927). Marie went into quasi retirement in October 1930 after her marriage to electronics and radio pioneer Lee De Forest, a man 26 years her senior. She became a leading socialite during the 1930's, though continuing to dabble in film acting up to 1938. Seven years after her husband's death in 1961, Marie De Forest became a well-known 'Novice Class' HAM radio operator and member of the Lockheed-affiliated LERC Amateur Radio Club. - Kathryn McGuire was born on 6 December 1903 in Peoria, Illinois, USA. She was an actress, known for The Navigator (1924), Sherlock Jr. (1924) and The Big Diamond Robbery (1929). She was married to George Landy. She died on 10 October 1978 in Los Angeles, California, USA.
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Annet Mahendru is an Afghan-American actress of Indian-Russian origin. She was born in Kabul to an Indian father (a journalist and professor) and a Russian mother (a businesswoman and artist). Annet spent her early years learning six languages while living in Afghanistan, Russia, and Europe. She put her curious mind to use playing competitive chess and earning a brown belt in Karate, sweeping a free sparring championship. At age 11, Annet choreographed a performance that gained her an appearance on German TV as a graceful Russian snow maiden that turns into a playful Indian dancer. Sad that her parents never signed her up for ballet classes as a little girl, she joined a local Rock 'n' Roll dance group, and later, began to study classical Indian dance, Bharatanatyam.
Annet finished high school in New York and received a Bachelor of Arts in English at St. John's University. After school, drawn by her passion for acting, she took classes at the HB studio, performed in plays, and Indie films. But it was in the course of pursuing a Master's degree in Global Affairs at NYU that Annet reached a crossroad in her life. She decided to drop out of NYU and escaped to the West Coast in search for yet another degree that would enable her to affect the kind of change she really wished for. This one was in Storytelling. Always being a big fan of Improvisation, she began studies at the Groundlings School and took on several comedy projects thereafter. Annet has also studied at the Imagined Life in Hollywood because she finds trans-formative experience and expression of the empathetic imagination to be the foundation of her work.
Everything, from growing up among a big Indian family on a healthy diet of Bollywood films to experiencing St. Petersburg's famous ballet, art and theatre scene, prepared Annet for her life as an ambassador of change through storytelling. Becoming an actress synthesized her many curiosities with her passion and mission.
Annet is best known for her starring role in the 2013 TV series The Americans, where she plays the role "Nina," the beautiful and mysterious spy opposite FBI Agent Stan Beeman (Noah Emmerich). "Annet Mahendru has been a revelation as Nina, bringing the character to life with a rich and subtle depth that keeps you guessing as to what's really percolating under the surface," said Executive Producers Joe Weisberg and Joel Fields. Other credits include 2 Broke Girls, Mike & Molly, Big Time Rush, The Blacklist, The X Files and feature films Escape From Tomorrow and Love Gloria.- Vanessa Martinez was born in Chicago, Illinois, USA. She is an actress, known for Flamin' Hot (2023), Fatal Attraction (2023) and Dirty John (2018).
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Olivia May was born on October 22nd, 1985 in Fresno, California USA as Olivia May Tuck. She is an actress, musician, singer, writer who has resided in Los Angeles, California USA since 2007. She enjoys living a private life with her husband, daughter and two cats. When not on set, she is writing music or working on scripts. She has released two musical albums; "Don't Look" in 2017 and "So Random" in 2019. Her music has been prominently featured on TV shows such as "Jersey Shore's Family Vacation" and "Total Bella's" among many others.- Actress
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Born in Seattle, Washington, Ally Maki moved to Los Angeles when she was 14 after being scouted by a talent agent. Upon her arrival in L.A., she was signed to Columbia Records in the all-girl band "The Valli Girls". In 2009, Maki was cast as "Dawn" on the ABC Family series "10 Things I Hate About You", and later followed with the film "Geography Club", playing Min, in 2013.
Now, she's showcasing her comedic acting chops in the TBS comedy series "Wrecked" as "Jess," the fun, feisty, and hopeless romantic of the ensemble cast. The show centers around a group of plane crash survivors adapting to life on a remote island, and adjusting to a new world. "Wrecked," premiered as the Number One Cable Comedy of 2016 and is airing its second season to growing ratings.
Other television credits include recurring roles on The CW series "Privileged", TNT's "Franklin and Bash", and guest starring roles on the series "New Girl", "2 Broke Girls", "NCIS", and "The Big Bang Theory".- She attended grammar school in Portland, Oregon until her family moved to Fort Worth, Texas, where she graduated from Fort Worth Polytechnic High School. Shortly afterward she proceeded to New York City to become a model. She graced the cover on many national magazines, and was selected as the model for the Chesterfield Girl, and her likeness appeared on Chesterfield ads and billboards across the United States. She won the "Miss America Aviation" crown in Birmingham, Alabama, which led her to being hired as a hostess/model for Trans-World Airlines (TWA) before being signed to a contract at Paramount Pictures.
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Ann Miller was born Johnnie Lucille Ann Collier on April 12, 1923 in Chireno, Texas. She lived there until she was nine, when her mother left her philandering father and moved with Ann to Los Angeles, California. Even at that young age, she had to support her mother, who was hearing-impaired and unable to hold a job. After taking tap-dancing lessons, she got jobs dancing in various Hollywood nightclubs while being home-schooled. Then, in 1937, RKO asked her to sign on as a contract player, but only if she could prove she was 18. Though she was really barely 14, she managed to get hold of a fake birth certificate, and so was signed on, playing dancers and ingénues in such films as Stage Door (1937), You Can't Take It with You (1938), Room Service (1938) and Too Many Girls (1940). In 1939, she appeared on Broadway in "George White's Scandals" and was a smash, staying on for two years. Eventually, RKO released her from her contract, but Columbia Pictures snapped her up to appear in such World War II morale boosters as True to the Army (1942) and Reveille with Beverly (1943). When she decided to get married, Columbia released her from her contract. The marriage was sadly unhappy and she was divorced in two years. This time, MGM picked her up, showcasing her in such films as Easter Parade (1948), On the Town (1949) and Kiss Me Kate (1953). In the mid-1950s, she asked to leave to marry again, and her request was granted. This marriage didn't last long, either, nor did a third. Ann then threw herself into work, appearing on television, in nightclubs and on the stage. She was a smash as the last actress to headline the Broadway production of "Mame" in 1969 and 1970, and an even bigger smash in "Sugar Babies" in 1979, which she played for nine years, on Broadway and on tour. She has cut back in recent years, but did appear in the Paper Mill Playhouse (Millburn, New Jersey) production of Stephen Sondheim's "Follies" in 1998, in which she sang the song "I'm Still Here", a perfect way to sum up the life and career of Ann Miller. On January 22, 2004, Ann Miller died at age 80 of lung cancer and was buried at the Holy Cross Cemetary in Culver City, California.- Actress
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Osa Massen (born Aase Madsen Iversen) was a newspaper photographer with an ambition to become a film editor. Prolific Danish film director Alice O'Fredericks gave her a role in her film Kidnapped (1935). After only two films in Denmark, she was given a screen test by 20th Century Fox and arrived in Hollywood in 1938.- Kathy Marlowe was born on 31 December 1934 in Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA. She was an actress, known for The Phenix City Story (1955), The George Burns and Gracie Allen Show (1950) and Queen of Outer Space (1958). She was married to Gerald Thompson and Harry Jackson. She died on 2 July 2022 in Newport Beach, California, USA.
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Arden Myrin was born in Little Compton, Rhode Island, USA. She is an actress and writer, known for The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel (2017), Shameless (2011) and Insatiable (2018). She was previously married to Dan Martin.- Actress
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Marilyn Monroe was an American actress, comedienne, singer, and model. Monroe is of English, Irish, Scottish and Welsh descent. She became one of the world's most enduring iconic figures and is remembered both for her winsome embodiment of the Hollywood sex symbol and her tragic personal and professional struggles within the film industry. Her life and death are still the subjects of much controversy and speculation.
She was born Norma Jeane Mortenson at the Los Angeles County Hospital on June 1, 1926. Her mother, Gladys Pearl (Monroe), was born in Piedras Negras, Coahuila, Mexico, to American parents from Indiana and Missouri, and was a film-cutter at Consolidated Film Industries. Marilyn's biological father has been established through DNA testing as Charles Stanley Gifford, who had been born in Newport, Rhode Island, to a family with deep roots in the state. Because Gladys was mentally and financially unable to care for young Marilyn, Gladys placed her in the care of a foster family, The Bolenders. Although the Bolender family wanted to adopt Marilyn, Gladys was eventually able to stabilize her lifestyle and took Marilyn back in her care when Marilyn was 7 years old. However, shortly after regaining custody of Marilyn, Gladys had a complete mental breakdown and was diagnosed as a paranoid schizophrenic and was committed to a state mental hospital. Gladys spent the rest of her life going in and out of hospitals and rarely had contact with young Marilyn. Once Marilyn became an adult and celebrated as a film star, she paid a woman by the name of Inez Melson to look in on the institutionalized Gladys and give detailed reports of her progress. Gladys outlived her daughter, dying in 1984.
Marilyn was then taken in by Gladys' best friend Grace Goddard, who, after a series of foster homes, placed Marilyn into the Los Angeles Orphan's Home in 1935. Marilyn was traumatized by her experience there despite the Orphan's Home being an adequate living facility. Grace Goddard eventually took Marilyn back to live with her in 1937 although this stay did not last long as Grace's husband began molesting Marilyn. Marilyn went to live with Grace's Aunt Ana after this incident, although due to Aunt Ana's advanced age she could not care properly for Marilyn. Marilyn once again for the third time had to return to live with the Goddards. The Goddards planned to relocated and according to law, could not take Marilyn with them. She only had two choices: return to the orphanage or get married. Marilyn was only 16 years old.
She decided to marry a neighborhood friend named James Dougherty; he went into the military, she modeled, they divorced in 1946. She owned 400 books (including Tolstoy, Whitman, Milton), listened to Beethoven records, studied acting at the Actors' lab in Hollywood, and took literature courses at UCLA downtown. 20th Century Fox gave her a contract but let it lapse a year later. In 1948, Columbia gave her a six-month contract, turned her over to coach Natasha Lytess and featured her in the B movie Ladies of the Chorus (1948) in which she sang three numbers : "Every Baby Needs a Da Da Daddy", "Anyone Can Tell I Love You" and "The Ladies of the Chorus" with Adele Jergens (dubbed by Virginia Rees) and others. Joseph L. Mankiewicz saw her in a small part in The Asphalt Jungle (1950) and put her in All About Eve (1950) , resulting in 20th Century re-signing her to a seven-year contract. Niagara (1953) and Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (1953) launched her as a sex symbol superstar.
When she went to a supper honoring her in the The Seven Year Itch (1955) , she arrived in a red chiffon gown borrowed from the studio (she had never owned a gown). That same year, she married and divorced baseball great Joe DiMaggio (their wedding night was spent in Paso Robles, California). After The Seven Year Itch (1955) , she wanted serious acting to replace the sexpot image and went to New York's Actors Studio. She worked with director Lee Strasberg and also underwent psychoanalysis to learn more about herself. Critics praised her transformation in Bus Stop (1956) and the press was stunned by her marriage to playwright Arthur Miller . True to form, she had no veil to match her beige wedding dress so she dyed one in coffee; he wore one of the two suits he owned. They went to England that fall where she made The Prince and the Showgirl (1957) with Laurence Olivier , fighting with him and falling further prey to alcohol and pills. Two miscarriages and gynecological surgery followed. So had an affair with Yves Montand . Work on her last picture The Misfits (1961) , written for her by departing husband Miller, was interrupted by exhaustion. She was dropped from the unfinished Something's Got to Give (1962) due to chronic lateness and drug dependency.
On August 4, 1962, Marilyn Monroe's day began with threatening phone calls. Dr. Ralph Greenson, Marilyn's physician, came over the following day and quoted later in a document "Felt it was possible that Marilyn had felt rejected by some of the people she had been close to." Apart from being upset that her publicist slept too long, she seemed fine. Pat Newcombe, who had stayed the previous night at Marilyn's house, left in the early evening as did Greenson who had a dinner date. Marilyn was upset he couldn't stay, and around 7:30pm she telephoned him to say that her second husband's son had called her. Peter Lawford also called Marilyn, inviting her to dinner, but she declined. Lawford later said her speech was slurred. As the evening went on there were other phone calls, including one from Jose Belanos, who said he thought she sounded fine. According to the funeral directors, Marilyn died sometime between 9:30pm and 11:30pm. Her maid unable to raise her but seeing a light under her locked door, called the police shortly after midnight. She also phoned Ralph Greenson who, on arrival, could not break down the bedroom door. He eventually broke in through French windows and found Marilyn dead in bed. The coroner stated she had died from acute barbiturate poisoning, and it was a 'probable suicide' though many conspiracies would follow in the years after her death.- Kristine Miller was born Jacqueline Olivia Eskesen, the daughter of Johannes Eskesen, vice-president of Standard Oil of Argentina, headquartered in Buenos Aires, where Miller was born. Miller's mother, Myrtle Bennett Witham, was an Orpheum Circuit singer from Fresno, California. After a decade in Argentina, the family moved to Myrtle's hometown of Fresno for a year, then to Copenhagen, Denmark in 1932. In 1938, before the beginning of the Second World War in Europe, they moved back to Fresno, then on to San Francisco.
Due to traveling internationally as a child, Miller speaks English, Spanish and Danish fluently, and has a working knowledge of Portuguese and German. Miller said of her childhood, "My mother was a professional singer and I think she was eager for me to go into the entertainment field." However, after she played a main role in her high school's production of George S. Kaufman "The American Way" (1939), her taste for show-business began to form. In one version of how she was discovered by Hollywood, in 1944 the 18-year-old Miller saw an opportunity when a Warner Brothers talent scout was to attend one of her school's performances. The scout never showed up, so she sent a letter and photograph to the studio, and garnered a screen test at Warner, where she changed her name to Kristine Miller. Though she failed the screen test, she was noticed by producer Hal B. Wallis, who was then feuding with the studio head, Jack L. Warner. Under acrimonious circumstances, Wallis left Warner Brothers for Paramount Pictures. Wallis brought with him Miller and another actress that also failed a screen test at Warner, the 21-year-old Lizabeth Scott.
At Paramount, Miller made her debut, an uncredited bit part, opposite fellow newcomer Scott in You Came Along (1945). Miller played a showgirl and was billed as "Jacqueleen Eskeson." The pair would appear together in five films, four of them produced by Hal Wallis.
In July 1946, it was announced that Hal Wallis planned to star Miller in the film version of the Broadway play, "Beggars Are Coming to Town" (1945), a noirish story of betrayal and vengeance. Wallis intended this to be Miller's breakout role. In the winter of 1946, Miller appeared briefly in Western noir, Desert Fury (1947). She played the priggish Claire Lindquist, daughter of a corrupt judge.
Immediately after Desert Fury, Wallis began work on "Deadlock", the original project name for "Beggars Are Coming to Town". Again Miller would be cast with "Desert Fury"'s Burt Lancaster and Wendell Corey. After weeks of rehearsals on the Modjeska Canyon location, under the direction of Byron Haskin, Miller suddenly became the second leading lady. Lizabeth Scott, ever competitive with all actresses, grabbed the Kay role for herself. Miller later recalled, "(Wallis) planned to star me in "I Walk Alone". He tested me with Burt; it was a wonderful test. But then Lizabeth Scott decided she wanted the role, and Lizabeth got whatever she wanted-from Hal Wallis! [laughs] So, I got the second part instead." The 21-year-old Miller was recast as the slumming socialite divorcée, Alexis Richardson. Miller was afraid that playing a "meanie" role might typecast her. In designing Miller's wardrobe, Edith Head was impressed by Miller's physique, describing it as "the most exciting figure since Betty Grable." The resulting film was renamed I Walk Alone (1947). Despite Miller's fears of being typecast as a femme fatale, film historians tend to typecast her "as always playing the 'good girl.'"
In early May, 1948, the 23-year-old Miller was loaned out again, this time to 20th Century Fox for "West of Tomorrow"-her first leading lady role. The screenplay was based on William Bowers' play of the same name. During WWII in New Guinea, a US Army Air Force squadron has been assigned to protect Australia and despite having inflicted heavy casualties on the Japanese, they supernaturally had none themselves. Miller played Jean Gillis, a Broadway actress and former anti-war activist, who joined the USO after her husband's death at Dunkirk. By happenstance, she ends up having to entertain the airmen by herself when she finds out the rest of her troupe is stranded. During an improvised "dinner dance," she learns about the pilots' wives and girlfriends and their hopes for the future, but equally learns about herself. Arthur Franz makes his film debut as Miller's love interest. The next morning, all but the squadron leader and Jean are killed after an attack on the airstrip. Similar to Death Takes a Holiday (1934), the airmen reach the epiphany of their lives in the few hours they spend with Jean. The resulting film was released as Jungle Patrol (1948), the sole film that Miller had 1st-place billing. Despite Miller's preference for Bowers' original title, the film is her personal favorite.
After establishing herself as a "discovery" of Hal Wallis, Miller soon found herself left behind. In an interview with Mike Fitzgerald, she was quoted as saying, "Hal called me the 'Viking Girl.' He didn't know what to do with me." The situation was aggravated by the return of veteran actors from overseas, either in uniform or the USO. Compounded by the economic slump after the war, rise of television and the breakup of the studio system, Miller's initial difficulties during the war years would be multiplied many fold. Miller's prospects began to look a little better when she met journalist and film producer Mark Hellinger, who felt sure that she could become a star. But Hellinger died suddenly in 1947, and Miller soon found herself making a living with the usual small roles that she had always been given. Of the nine films she would make under contract to Paramount, three were loan-outs to other studios, two of which were more significant than her Paramount films, with the exception of I Walk Alone. Typical of the Paramount years, in Sorry, Wrong Number (1948), she was cast as the wife of the investigating detective but was recast as the mistress of the physician, dropping from 3rd to 13th place in billing.
Later that year, she moved on to a more substantial part, again opposite Lizabeth Scott, in Too Late for Tears (1949). In her third and last loan-out-this time to United Artists-Miller played Kathy Palmer, the sister-in-law of Jane Palmer (Scott), whom she suspects has murdered her brother. As she is romanced by Don DeFore, the pair quietly investigate the shady dealings of Jane.
At the end of 1948, Miller made a brief appearance in the "weepie" Paid in Full (1950). In the last film she would do for Paramount, Miller was to play Nancy Langley, the younger modeling sister of Jane (Lizabeth Scott), a department store illustrator, who allows her younger sister to marry Bill Prentice (Robert Cummings), despite Jane's love for him. A few years later, Jane has an argument with Nancy, who catches Jane and Bill having an affair. Distraught, Jane backs up her car and accidentally kills her young niece. But as with 'I Walk Alone', Miller's role was given to another actress-Diana Lynn. Miller ended up playing a bridesmaid at Nancy's wedding, dropping from 3rd to 10th place in billing. In February 1949, it was announced that Miller's contact with Paramount was dropped due to the post-war slump in the film industry. That December, Miller's marriage with television executive, William Schuyler, was announced.
Undaunted by career setbacks, Miller tried her hand with smaller studios such as Monogram and Republic Pictures, though she would still work for the occasional big studio. Miller also made further incursions in the then-new medium of television, which she began before her contract with Paramount was dropped. Despite the demands of raising a family, the 1950s would be Miller's most prolific years, seeing her as a television regular. Throughout the '50s, she was able to display a broader acting range than when under Paramount and Hal Wallis. Though Miller missed out on being Lizabeth Scott's younger sister in "Paid in Full", she played a younger sister in the noirish Shadow on the Wall (1950), which also involved two sisters competing over the same man. The older sister, played by Ann Sothern, discovers that her younger, married sister is having an affair with Sothern's fiancé, which leads to murderous results and short screen-time for Miller. Though never leaving the noir genre, Miller would begin her reputation for Westerns with Young Daniel Boone (1950), but as the female lead.
Later that year she would return to the Western genre with High Lonesome (1950). John Drew Barrymore is a misunderstood teenager, Cooncat, who creates a rift between Miller's rancher father and her fiancé, who believes Cooncat murdered his parents.
In the fall of 1951, Miller was cast as an Eastern European in the Cold War thriller, The Steel Fist (1952), opposite Roddy McDowall. Miller played Marlina, a young woman who hides a student protester (McDowall) from the communists. In the spring of 1952, Miller appeared in her second femme fatale role. In "The Iron Banner Story," an episode of Dangerous Assignment (1950), an espionage series starring Brian Donlevy, she played Lilli Terrescu, a woman with a dark secret in post-war Greece. As with The Steel Fist, Miller used her accent skills in two Dangerous Assignment episodes and later in The Millionaire episode, "The Anton Bohrman Story." Later in the year, Miller was the second female lead in her first musical, Tropical Heat Wave (1952).
On July 27, 1953, Miller finally married William Schuyler in Santa Barbara. That October, it was announced that the Schuylers were expecting their first baby.
In 1954, Miller appeared as the second leading lady in three films. Flight Nurse (1953), starring Joan Leslie, was a drama about US Air Force flight nurses in the Korean War. Miller is a fellow officer of Leslie, involved in a romantic triangle with two pilots. Geraldine (1953) is a comedy starring Mala Powers. In the noir Western Hell's Outpost (1954), Miller again costarred with Leslie. "Hell's Outpost" would introduced Miller to Jim Davis, who would be the male lead for the only television series that Miller had a continuing role in. During that year, Miller made two appearances on the television series The Lone Wolf (1954), starring Louis Hayward. In one episode, Miller played an adulterous wife reminiscent of "The Shadow on the Wall", but is shot by the cuckolded husband instead. She also made a guest appearance as Mrs. Manning on Republic's first television series, Stories of the Century (1954), starring Mary Castle and Miller's old "Hell's Outpost" costar, Jim Davis.
In 1955, Miller returned to "Stories of the Century" to star in her most famous role-Margaret "Jonesy" Jones. The series concerned a pair of railroad detectives dealing with cases from the 1850s to the first decade of the 20th century, "wrapping them around previously shot films and serials to save money." Typically, the Jones character would do reconnaissance before Matt Clark (Jim Davis) arrived, misleading everyone into thinking the two were not working together. Originally Miller was to star in the series, but was unable due to her first pregnancy. As a result, Mary Castle, a Rita Hayworth lookalike, took her place for the first 26 episodes. Castle had portrayed Clark's fellow detective Frankie Adams. After Castle quit or was fired, Miller replaced her, much to the disappointment of the then director, William Witney, who left after directing a few episodes with Miller. Despite the change of leading lady and the replacement of Witney, "Stories of the Century" with Miller went on to be the first Western to win an Emmy Award in 1955. Despite the award and excellent ratings, the series was cancelled.
After the cancellation of Century, Miller changed genres with the first of four appearances on Science Fiction Theatre (1955). In "The Strange Dr. Lorenz" (1955), she played the wife of a physician, whose debilitating condition is cured by a miraculous royal jelly. But the jelly has an unexpected side-effect. In "Operation Flypaper" (1956) she and Vincent Price are scientists trying to catch a thief who can suspend time. During this period, Miller would make three Western films in succession: Thunder Over Arizona (1956), Domino Kid (1957) and The Persuader (1957), a religious Western starring William Talman. Miller would rejoin Jim Davis for the last time in an episode of M Squad (1957)-"The Case of the Double Face" (May 23, 1958), starring Lee Marvin. Miller is married to a mild-mannered, bespectacled Davis, who is accused by the Chicago police of being a jewel thief. Miller's last film role was in The Heart Is a Rebel (1958), a religious drama starring Ethel Waters.
Miller's last television appearance was as Ruth Hudson in the 1961 episode "Prince Jim" of NBC's Tales of Wells Fargo (1957), starring Dale Robertson. Of the genres and cross-genres spanning her film career, Miller participated in making five traditional noirs, one noir-thriller, four Westerns, two noir Westerns, one religious Western, three military dramas, two comedies, one comedy-drama, one soap opera, one religious drama and one musical. Seven of Miller's roles were walk-ons or deleted from the final film. Her television work involved similar genres. In contradistinction to being only a supporting actress as described by most film historians, she was leading lady in six of 22 films.
Due to demands of family and her husband's business, Miller retired from acting. The Schuylers left Los Angeles for the San Francisco Bay Area in the early 1960s. Previous to the move, her husband was setting up television stations throughout Northern California, such as Sacramento's KSCH and KTVU in Oakland. Together with William they founded two television stations in Monterey-KMST and the Spanish-language KSMS. The Schuylers eventually settled on the Monterey peninsula in 1969, where William became president of the Schuyler Broadcasting Corporation. The Schuylers later lived in Idaho during the 1990s, where they started two television stations. They returned to Monterey in June 2001. Ever civic-minded since her Hollywood days, Kristine Miller has lectured on her experience in film and television in Monterey as well as participating in local charitable activities. - Fiery, dark-haired, exotic-looking Donna Martell was born of Italian ancestry Irene Palma de Maria, the daughter of a master tailor for a major clothing manufacturing company. She attended L.A. City College where she excelled at athletics, especially baseball. During this time, Donna was persuaded by a classmate to audition for a theatrical agent from the Donaldson-Middleton Agency. At just 17 years of age, she was "signed on the spot" by Republic Studios to appear in as an ingénue alongside Roy Rogers and Dale Evans in the western Apache Rose (1947).
Initially billed as Donna DeMario, she went on to receive steady offers to work in westerns, due in no small part to her equestrian skills (she owned a Palomino named Pal, stabled at the San Bernardino Orange Ranch). Though wooed by three of the majors (MGM, 20th Century Fox and Warner Brothers), Donna opted to sign with Universal-International. However, after two years, she became dissatisfied with the meager roles offered her and she decided to go freelance, in due course establishing herself as a prolific and capable television actress. Often cast as south-of-the-border senoritas, she played leads opposite most of the famous western leading men of the era, including Gene Autry, Randolph Scott, Dale Robertson (Tales of Wells Fargo (1957)), Gene Barry (Bat Masterson (1958)) and Clint Walker (Cheyenne (1955)). In 2002, Donna won the Golden Boot Award for her contribution to the western genre.
In addition to her sagebrush heroines, Donna also played an Indian princess in Last Train from Bombay (1952) and Jennifer Jones's sister in the lavishly produced romantic A-grader Love Is a Many-Splendored Thing (1955). In retrospect, she may wish to forget her role as the commander of a spacecraft in the rare sci-fi feature Project Moon Base (1953), filmed in ten days (!) on a shoestring budget at the old Hal Roach studio in Culver City. Her character in this dreadful (and, indeed, misogynistic) picture was called Colonel Briteis (pronounced 'Bright Eyes'). Its sole saving grace was brevity (63 minutes).
In a later interview, Donna asserted that she had never socialized with her male co-stars, "unless it was for publicity". From 1953, she was married to the baseball player Gene Corso (of the Pittsburgh Pirates) who died in 1996.
Donna's acting career came to an end in 1963, though she continued to appear in some TV commercials. For several years, she ran her own business, selling floor coverings. Later still, she became a frequent attendee at film festivals and conventions. - Patricia Paz Maria Medina was born on July 19, 1919 in Liverpool, England to a Spanish father and an English mother. She began acting as a teenager in the late 1930s and worked her way up to leading roles in the mid-1940s, then left for Hollywood. Medina teamed up with British actor Louis Hayward and they appeared together in Fortunes of Captain Blood (1950), The Lady and the Bandit (1951), Lady in the Iron Mask (1952) and Captain Pirate (1952). Voluptuous and exotic-looking, Medina was often typecast in period melodramas such as The Black Knight (1954). Two of her more notable films were William Witney's Stranger at My Door (1956) and Orson Welles's Confidential Report (1955), a follow-up of The Third Man (1949), based on the radio series "The Lives of Harry Lime". Although prolific during the early 1950s, her film career faded away by the end of the decade, leading to stage and television roles.
Medina appeared as Margarita Cortazar in four episodes of Walt Disney's Zorro (1957), and as Diana Coulter in two episodes of Richard Boone's Have Gun - Will Travel (1957). She returned to the screen in Robert Aldrich's adaptation of the lesbian-themed drama The Killing of Sister George (1968). She and her husband, American actor Joseph Cotten, toured together in several plays and on Broadway in the murder mystery, "Calculated Risk". Her appearances on television include episodes of Bonanza (1959) titled "The Spanish Grant" and The Alfred Hitchcock Hour (1962) titled "See the Monkey Dance". She played Harriet Balfour in an episode of Perry Mason (1957) titled "The Case of the Lucky Loser", and as Lucia Belmont in an episode of The Man from U.N.C.L.E. (1964) titled "The Foxes and Hounds Affair".
Patricia Medina retired from acting in 1978 after 40 years in the motion picture industry. She died at age 92 of natural causes on April 28, 2012 in Los Angeles, California. She was interred at Blandford Cemetery in Petersburg, Virginia, alongside Cotten. - Actress
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Vivid, show-stopping French entertainer Liliane (Dina) Montevecchi was born in Paris on October 13, 1932, and first put on ballet shoes at the age of 8. Nine years later, having entered the Conservatoire for two years of training and working with various companies, she would become a prima ballerina in Roland Petit's ballet company.
Hollywood took a sudden interest in her in the early 1950s, along with other foreign-born ballet dancers such as Leslie Caron, Zizi Jeanmaire, and Moira Shearer. Signed to a contract with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, she began appearing in their musicals. Studying at the Actor's Studio at one point, such cinematic ventures as The Glass Slipper (1955) and Daddy Long Legs (1955) (both starring Caron), plus Moonfleet (1955), Meet Me in Las Vegas (1956), The Sad Sack (1957), Me and the Colonel (1958), and the Elvis Presley vehicle King Creole (1958) came and went without much fanfare for Liliane.
It was the live stage that would raise her to legendary status. First, she starred with the Folies Bergere for nine years, traveling all over the world. She then conquered Broadway in the 1980s, winning both Tony and Drama Desk awards for her flashy role in the musical "Nine", based on Federico Fellini's art-house film 8½ (1963). She earned a Tony Award nomination several years later with an equally flashy role in the musical "Grand Hotel".
The entertainer, beloved for her delightful mangling of the English language, has appeared in concert at Carnegie Hall and Lincoln Center, and has vamped and camped with the best of them in her acclaimed cabaret shows and niteries from here to Timbuktu. These include the semi-autobiographical shows "On the Boulevard" and "Back On the Boulvards."
She continued to go strong at age 70+ showing time and time again that she was a one-of-a-kind diva who knows no limit. In December 2010, she appeared with Kaye Ballard and Donna McKechnie in the musical revue "From Broadway with Love," and in early 2012, she joined Ballard once again, along with Lee Roy Reams in a second revue "Doin' It for Love." Never married, she died a few years later of colon cancer in her beloved New York on June 29, 2018.- Actress
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As Disney's lively lass Katie O'Gill, she was the freshness of spring. She could inspire you to dance a jig through a field of flowers. Her entrancing green eyes and catchy spirit had that kind of life-affirming effect. Cute, spunky, almond-eyed British actress Janet Munro was deemed to be an actress from day one as the daughter of Scottish stage and variety-hall comedian Alex Munro (1911-1986) (born Alexander Horsburgh). Janet Neilson Horsburgh was born in Blackpool (near Liverpool), Lancashire, England on September 28, 1934. Her entertainer father adopted the name Munro a few years after she was born. His wife, Janet's mother Phyllis, died when Janet was 8 and she was raised by his second wife, Lilias.
Janet first trained as a teenager in repertory theatre in the Lancashire area, and in the late 1950s she found popularity on British TV, even earning the title of "Miss Television of 1958" from a fan magazine. She also dabbled in films and had prominent roles in the breezy comedy Small Hotel (1957), the drama The Young and the Guilty (1959), and the creepy sci-fi/horror The Crawling Eye (1958) [aka The Trollenberg Terror].
Adaptable to both comedy and drama, the little charmer caught the eye of Walt Disney who saw big things for her, and she was signed to a five-picture deal in 1959. She made four. Appealing to a brand new generation of Britishers and Americans as the scrappy, brunette-banged ingénue of several box-office family films, she brightened up the screen with her performances in Darby O'Gill and the Little People (1959), Third Man on the Mountain (1959), and Swiss Family Robinson (1960).
The Golden Globe winner for "most promising newcomer" eventually outgrew Disney and tried to move ahead by altering her wholesome image with some mature, spicier roles, but audiences didn't respond well to this sudden departure. The idea of an adult Janet Munro playing overly-sexy ladies and seriously downtrodden women did not take and her career quickly faltered. Despite a BAFTA nomination for her role in Walk in the Shadow (1962), she began to see life unraveling both personally and professionally right before her eyes.
Janet's marriages to actors Tony Wright and Ian Hendry fell by the wayside and two miscarriages, plus chronic medical ills, only deepened her suffering. Worse yet, she developed an acute alcohol problem. Semi-retired from acting between 1964 and 1968 while married to Hendry in order to raise her children, she found the going difficult when she tried to return full-time.
Ironically, one of Janet's last screen roles showed her at her dramatic best, a boozing pop star in the British film Sebastian (1968). Four years later Janet died under somewhat mysterious circumstances. Reports circulated that she choked to death at a London hotel while drinking tea. The immediate cause of her death was acute myocarditis; the underlying cause was chronic ischemic heart disease. The sun set all too soon on this lovely actress when she was only 38. She was survived by her daughters, Sally and Corrie Hendry.- Actress
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Kari Matchett, a Canadian actress, skillfully embodies the character of Linda in "Fargo" Season 5. Her versatile acting prowess brings a profound depth to Linda, enhancing the show's narrative.
Kari Matchett grew up in Lethbridge, Alberta. She attended Lethbridge Collegiate Institute and later pursued her passion for acting at the National Theatre School in Montreal and the Moscow Theatre School. Matchett's exposure to diverse acting methodologies has significantly shaped her dynamic acting style.
Kari Matchett's career spans a range of notable roles in both television and film. She first rose to prominence in Canada with her performance in "Power Play" and subsequently in "The Rez."- Actress
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Born in Boise City, Oklahoma, Vera Miles attended school in Pratt, Kansas and Wichita, Kansas. The patrician beauty of Miss Miles won her the title of "Miss Kansas" in 1948, leading soon to small roles in Hollywood films and television series. Fame came to the forthright, spirited Miles when she attracted the attention of two master directors, Alfred Hitchcock and John Ford. Ford cast her in the classic western The Searchers (1956) and Hitchcock, who put her under personal contract and hailed her as his "new Grace Kelly", paired her with the great Henry Fonda in The Wrong Man (1956). Hitchcock cast Miles in the potentially star-making role of Judy Barton in Vertigo (1958), but Miles withdrew from the film when she became pregnant. Hitchcock gave Miles a supporting role in another masterpiece Psycho (1960), as did Ford when he cast her opposite John Wayne and James Stewart in The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance (1962), She also starred in such films as Beau James (1957) opposite Bob Hope, The FBI Story (1959) opposite Stewart, Back Street (1961) opposite Susan Hayward and John Gavin and Sergeant Ryker (1968) opposite Lee Marvin, as well as showing her consistently remarkable and versatile talent on dozens of popular television movies and series including The Alfred Hitchcock Hour (1962), The Twilight Zone (1959), The Outer Limits (1963), The Fugitive (1963), My Three Sons (1960), Bonanza (1959), Columbo (1971) and Murder, She Wrote (1984). In 1983, she reprised her role as "Lila Crane" in the film sequel Psycho II (1983), starring Anthony Perkins. Although, too often, the stunningly beautiful Miles' gifts were underutilized, before her retirement in 1995, hers was a most intriguing and enduring Hollywood career.- Jacqui Maxwell was born in 1981 in Sydney, New South Wales, Australia. She is an actress, known for The Dukes of Hazzard (2005), 24 (2001) and Gilmore Girls (2000).
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One of the leading sex symbols of the 1950s and 1960s, film actress Jayne Mansfield was born Vera Jayne Palmer on April 19, 1933 in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania, the only child of Vera J. (nee Palmer; later Peers) and Herbert W. Palmer. Her parents were well-to-do, with her father a successful attorney in Phillipsburg, New Jersey, where she spent a portion of her childhood. Her parents were both born with the same surname, and her ancestry was seven eighths English and Cornish and one eighth German. She was reportedly a talented pianist and played the violin when she was young.
Tragedy struck when Jayne was three, when her father suddenly died of a heart attack. Three years later, her mother remarried and she and her mother moved to Dallas, Texas, buying a small home where she had violin concerts in the driveway of their home. Her IQ was reportedly 163, and she attended the University of Dallas and participated in little-theater productions. In 1949, at the age of 16, she married a man five years her senior named Paul Mansfield. In November 1950, when Jayne was seventeen, their daughter, Jayne Marie Mansfield was born. The union ended in divorce but she kept the surname Mansfield as a good surname for an actress.
After some productions there and elsewhere, Jayne decided to go to Hollywood. Her first film was a bit role as a cigarette girl in Pete Kelly's Blues (1955). Although the roles in the beginning were not much, she was successful in gaining those roles because of her ample physical attributes which placed her in two other films that year, Hell on Frisco Bay (1955) and Illegal (1955). Her breakout role came the next year with a featured part in The Burglar (1957). By the time she portrayed Rita Marlowe in Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter? (1957) and Playgirl After Dark (1960), Jayne was now known as the poor man's Marilyn Monroe. She did not get the plum roles that Marilyn got in her productions. Instead, her films were more of a showcase for her body more than anything else. She did have a real talent for acting, but the movie executives insisted she stay in her dumb blonde stereotype roles. By the 1960s, her career had options that grew lower. She made somewhat embarrassing guest appearances like on the popular game show What's My Line? (1950), she appeared on the show four times in 1956, 1957, 1964, and 1966 and many other 1950s and 1960s game shows. By 1962, she was dropped from 20th Century Fox and the rest of her career had smaller options like being in B movies and low budget movies or performing at food stores or small nightclubs.
While traveling from a nightclub in Biloxi, Mississippi and 30 miles from New Orleans to where she was to be on television the following day, she was killed instantly on Highway 90 in Slidell, Louisiana in a car crash in the early hours of June 29, 1967, when the car in which she was riding slammed into the back of a semi-tractor trailer truck that had stopped due to a truck in front of the tractor trailer that was spraying for bugs. Her car went under the truck at nearly 80 miles per hour. Her boyfriend Samuel Brody and their driver Ronnie Harrison, were also killed. The damage to the car was so bad that the engine was twisted sideways. She was not, however, decapitated, as had long been misreported. She was 34 years old.
Mansfield's funeral was on July 3, 1967 and hundreds of people lined the main street of Pen Argyl for Mansfield's funeral, a small private ceremony at Fairview Cemetery in Plainfield (outside Pen Argyl), Pennsylvania (where her father was also buried), attended by her family. The only ex-husband to attend was Mickey Hargitay. Her final film, Single Room Furnished (1966), was released the following year. In 2000, Mansfield's 97 year old mother, Mrs. Vera Peers, was interred alongside Mansfield.
After Mansfield's death, Mansfield's mother, as well as her ex-husband Mickey Hargitay, William Pigue (legal guardian for her daughter, Jayne Marie), Charles Goldring (Mansfield's business manager), and Bernard B. Cohen and Jerome Webber (both administrators of the estate) all filed unsuccessful suits to gain control of her estate, which was initially estimated at $600,000 ($3,712,000 in 2018 dollars), including the Pink Palace (estimated at $100,000 ($619,000 in 2018 dollars)), a sports car sold for $7,000 ($43,000 in 2018 dollars), her jewelry, and Sam Brody's $185,000 estate left to her in his last will ($1,145,000 in 2018 dollars).
In 1971, Beverly Brody sued the Mansfield estate for $325,000 ($2,011,000 in 2018 dollars) worth of presents and jewelry given to Mansfield by Sam Brody; the suit was settled out of court.
In 1977, Mansfield's four eldest children (Jayne Marie, Mickey, Zoltan, and Mariska) went to court to discover that some $500,000 in debt which Mansfield had incurred ($3,093,000 in 2018 dollars) and litigation had left the estate insolvent.- Actress
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Kate Mara is an American actress. She starred in the Netflix political drama House of Cards (2013) as Zoe Barnes and appeared in the Fox TV series 24 (2001) as computer analyst Shari Rothenberg. She appeared in Brokeback Mountain (2005), We Are Marshall (2006), Shooter (2007), Transsiberian (2008), Stone of Destiny (2008), The Open Road (2009), Transcendence (2014), and Fantastic Four (2015) as the Invisible Woman. She also appeared in the FX horror mini-series American Horror Story (2011) as Hayden McClaine. Mara's film debut was in Random Hearts (1999), with Harrison Ford in 1999, directed by Sydney Pollack. In 2015, she also had a supporting role as astronaut "Beth Johanssen" in director Ridley Scott's film The Martian (2015). In the same year, she also starred as Ashley Smith in the movie Captive (2015).
Mara also starred in Morgan (2016), Megan Leavey (2017) and My Days of Mercy (2017).
Kate was born in Bedford, New York. She is one of four children of Kathleen McNulty (Rooney) and NFL football team New York Giants executive Timothy Christopher Mara. Her younger sister is actress Rooney Mara.
Her grandfathers were Wellington Mara, co-owner of the Giants, and Timothy Rooney, owner of Yonkers Raceway, and her grand-uncle is Steelers Chairman Dan Rooney, the former US Ambassador to Ireland. She is the great-granddaughter of Art Rooney Sr., the founder of the Pittsburgh Steelers football franchise. She often sings the national anthem at Giants home games. Her father has Irish, German, and French-Canadian ancestry, and her mother is of Irish and Italian descent.
Mara graduated from high school a year early. She was accepted at the prestigious NYU Tisch School of the Arts but deferred her admission for three consecutive years.- Actress
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Leighton Marissa Meester was born in Fort Worth, Texas, to Constance Lynn (Haas) and Douglas Jay Meester. Although born in Texas, Meester spent her early years in Marco Island, Florida with her grandparents. There, she became involved with the local playhouse and made her stage debut in a production of "The Wizard of Oz".
She moved to New York with her mother at the age of 11 and was soon working as a model and appearing in TV commercials. A few years later, at age 14, she and her mother moved again, this time to Los Angeles, where she began to pick up TV work, making her debut in Disciple (1999).
A steady stream of TV work followed, and in 2007 she landed the role of Blair Waldorf in Gossip Girl (2007), which made her famous. This led to more TV and movie roles. In 2009, she launched a recording career with the single, "Somebody to Love".- Actress
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Tracy Middendorf was born on 26 January 1970 in Miami Beach, Florida, USA. She is an actress and producer, known for New Nightmare (1994), Mission: Impossible III (2006) and Scream: The TV Series (2015). She has been married to Franz Wisner since 2 January 2005. They have one child.- Actress
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Striking, dark-haired beauty Zena Moyra Marshall was born of French (from her mother's side) and English/Irish (her father's) ancestry in Nairobi, Kenya. After the early death of her father, her mother remarried and moved the family to Leicestershire. Zena received her education from St Mary's Roman Catholic School in Ascot. Her interest in the acting profession matured after a wartime theatrical tour with the Entertainments National Service Association (ENSA), while still in her teens. After completing her training at RADA, her exotic looks led to a contract with the Rank Organisation where she was groomed by the so-called 'charm school' as a sultry temptress and second lead in costume films, romantic melodramas and thrillers.
Marshall made her screen debut in the stagey, moribund epic Caesar and Cleopatra (1945) with a bit-part as a handmaiden. Interestingly this film was also a screen bow for future James Bond star Roger Moore, uncredited as a Roman soldier. Marshall's subsequent career was anything but meteoric. For several years she was given only minor supporting roles in productions by Rank affiliates, such as GFD/Two Cities and Gainsborough, including Sleeping Car to Trieste (1948), Snowbound (1948) and So Long at the Fair (1950). A brief sojourn in Hollywood resulted in a lacklustre Allied Artists musical, Let's Be Happy (1957), in which she played an amorous redhead, rivalling star Vera-Ellen for the affections of crooner Tony Martin. During the 1950s she managed to rekindle her theatrical career and, by the end of the decade, went on tour through Germany and the Netherlands with "The Late Edwina Black". Marshall was one of the first actresses to be featured in a British television commercial (for shampoo) on early ITV. Television did, in the end, become her favoured medium; she had some of her better on-screen moments in three episodes of Danger Man (1960), opposite Patrick McGoohan, between 1961 and 1964.
Zena Marshall's main claim to fame rests on her portrayal of the Eurasian double agent, Miss Taro, in the first ever Bond film, Dr. No (1962). Her character was, incidentally, the first woman seduced by Bond, prior to his encounter with Ursula Andress in the part of Honey Ryder. Another noted beauty, the reigning Miss Jamaica, Marguerite LeWars, was originally slated to screen test for Miss Taro. However, LeWars declined for reasons of 'personal modesty' and is merely glimpsed in the film in a bit part as an unnamed photographer. Marshall herself was at first unhappy with the script, but Terence Young, who had previously worked with her on the poorly-received costume biopic The Bad Lord Byron (1949), lightened some of the dialogue with humour. In the end, the bedroom scene with Sean Connery took three days to shoot, because Marshall struggled with the idea of having to spit in her co-star's face, after Bond has her character turned over to the superintendent of police. Miss Taro remains one of the most iconic of Bond villainesses.
Marshall's last roles of note were as an Italian countess in Those Magnificent Men in Their Flying Machines or How I Flew from London to Paris in 25 Hours 11 Minutes (1965), and as a secretary fighting alien enemies (alongside Charles Hawtrey, incongruously cast as an accountant) in the insipid sci-fi outing The Terrornauts (1967). After that, she retired from the screen and settled into domestic life with her third husband, the writer/producer Ivan Foxwell.- Everyone knows (or should know) Lois Maxwell as the one and only "Miss Moneypenny," but there's much more to her acting career than that. She started out against her parents' will, and without their knowledge, in a Canadian children's radio program, credited as "Robin Wells." Before the age of 15 she left for England with the Canadian army's Entertainment Corps and managed (after her age had been discovered) to get herself enrolled in The Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, where she met and became friends with Roger Moore. Her movie career started with a Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger production, A Matter of Life and Death (1946). After having won The Most Promising Newcomer Golden Globe Award in 1947, she went to Hollywood and made six films before she decided to try her luck in Italy. She had to leave Italy to go to England when her husband became ill, and since then she has had roles in a number of movies besides the first 14 Bond movies. In 1989 she retired.
- Kim Murphy was born on 8 February 1974 in Olympia, Washington, USA. She was an actress, known for Houseguest (1995), City of Angels (1998) and Level 9 (2000). She died on 26 October 2018 in the USA.
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Christina Moore is a true multi-hyphenate who has successfully built a career as an actor, writer, and producer over her 20-year career. She has starred in more than 80 television shows and films and has produced ten films in the last seven years.
Moore is best known for her work as a sketch comedian in "MadTV" (FOX), as Laurie Forman in "That 70s Show" (FOX), as Butterfly in "Without a Paddle" (Paramount), as Tracy Clark in the re-make of "90210" (CW), as Christina Ross in "Jessie" (Disney Channel) and as Mandi Heiser in TNT's hit series "Claws". She has also starred on such hit shows as "Friends", "True Blood", "Mom", "Last Man Standing", "Two and a Half Men", "Will & Grace" & "24".
In December 2022, Moore released two holiday movies worldwide. "I Believe in Santa", which she produced and stars in, was released on Netflix and quickly became the #2 movie globally on Netflix. "A Hollywood Christmas", which she developed and produced, was released on HBO Max and rapidly became the #1 movie on HBO Max. In summer 2022, she also released the film "That's Amor" on Netflix, which became the #2 movie in the US and #3 globally in its first two weeks on Netflix, garnering over thirty million viewing hours. Representation is extremely important to Moore, which is why her films have diverse casts and characters of all backgrounds, religions and sexual orientations.
In 2015, Moore began her work behind the camera when she co-wrote and produced the film "Running Wild", starring Sharon Stone. The film graced the festival circuit and debuted with a small theatrical release. Emboldened by this, Moore helmed a creative team that worked tirelessly to creatively develop and produce ten more films over the next seven years. Her focus lays on excellent story-telling and high production value while creating a nurturing environment for young talent to emerge. The films have homes on Netflix, HBO Max and Amazon Prime.
Moore has also ventured into the world of event series in which she is the female lead and a co-producer. "Casa Grande" is represented by Warner Bros Television Group and being released by Telus Canada and FreeVee USA in early 2023.
Moore is married to John Ducey. They reside in Sherman Oaks, CA.- Actress
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Juliette Marquis was born in Kiev, Ukrainian SSR, USSR [now Ukraine]. She is an actress and producer, known for Horn Maker, Dent (2017) and Into the Sun (2005).- Tania Mallet was born in Blackpool, England. Her English-born mother, Olga Mironoff, was of Russian descent, and had been a beautiful chorus girl. Her father was a successful English car salesman, Henry Mallet. Her parents divorced and Olga remarried, to George Dawson, with whom she had three sons. George turned out to be a non-violent con man who was sent to prison for three years for committing fraud. Her older brother is actress Helen Mirren's father, making Mallet and Mirren first cousins. They grew up together. Helen wrote in her 2007 autobiography that her cousin "survived this extraordinary upbringing and came out miraculously a loyal and generous person." Tania took a course at the Lucy Clayton School of Modelling and started working as a model at just 16 years old.
In 1961, she appeared as herself in the documentary about models in Michael Winner's Girls Girls Girls! (1961). In 1963 she was considered for the role of the lead James Bond girl in From Russia with Love (1963). Although half-Russian, her provincial English accent deemed her unsuitable for the role of the Russian love interest, so she lost the role to Daniela Bianchi. However, the following year she was cast in the next Bond film, Goldfinger (1964) , playing the ill-fated Tilly Masterson. She agreed to appear in "Goldfinger" as an experiment. She was earning £2,000 a week as a model, and after much bargaining managed to secure only £150 a week as her fee for the film. She claimed that she could not afford to continue working as an actress, because she was earning more as a model. She was supporting her mother and putting her half-brothers thru school with her income as a model.
Tania had mixed feelings about her time on "Goldfinger". Filming was fun, but in her personal life her long-time boyfriend had died at the same time. She had no desire to pursue a career as an actress and went back to modeling. Her first marriage ended when she was still young. In 1976, she married her second husband, Simon Radcliffe, a management consultant. She became a stepmother to his children, including publicist Louisa Radcliffe. It was a marriage that lasted 40 years, when her husband died in 2016, leaving her a widow. She enjoyed a warm relationship with Mirren since childhood, as evidenced by the photos of the two smiling cousins in the latter's autobiography. Mallet continued to attend James Bond events and autographed her photographs at these events.
She died on March 30, 2019 at the age of 77 from undisclosed causes. A day later, Mirren publicly posted a loving tribute, calling Tania a "kind and generous" person and a "great optimist". - Actress
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English supporting actress of the 60s and 70, best known for her steamy role as Glenda in the Michael Caine cult gangster flic Get Carter (1971). Her casting by director Mike Hodges had been on account of two strong earlier performances in anthology TV dramas devised by Alun Owen. Her local background also lent itself to maintaining the film's regional authenticity.
The daughter of Eric Gerald Moffat and his wife Doris Emmie (née Wells), Geraldine was born in Nottingham and trained at the Bristol Old Vic Theatre School. She made her debut on the stage in a 1959 Old Vic production of Lysistrata and acted in several plays for the Nottingham Playhouse Theatre Company in 1964. Her first regular role on the screen was as a veterinarian's aide in Badger's Bend (1963), a series for children, released by Associated-Rediffusion Television. Often featured in glamorous, chic roles, Geraldine made subsequent guest appearances on several popular prime- time entertainments like The Baron (1966), Department S (1969), Z Cars (1962),UFO (1970) and The Persuaders! (1971).
In 1971, Geraldine married the West End solicitor (and alto saxophonist) Walter Maurice Houser. She retired from screen acting in 1980. Her two sons are video game designers Sam and Dan Houser.- Actress
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Julianne Moore was born Julie Anne Smith in Fort Bragg, North Carolina on December 3, 1960, the daughter of Anne (Love), a social worker, and Peter Moore Smith, a paratrooper, colonel, and later military judge. Her mother moved to the U.S. in 1951, from Greenock, Scotland. Her father, from Burlington, New Jersey, has German, Irish, Welsh, German-Jewish, and English ancestry.
Moore spent the early years of her life in over two dozen locations around the world with her parents, during her father's military career. She finally found her place at Boston University, where she earned her Bachelor of Fine Arts (B.F.A.) degree in acting from the School of the Performing Arts. After graduation (in 1983), She took the stage name "Julianne Moore" because there was another actress named "Julie Anne Smith". Julianne moved to New York and worked extensively in theater, including appearances off-Broadway in two Caryl Churchill plays, Serious Money and Ice Cream With Hot Fudge and as Ophelia in Hamlet at The Guthrie Theatre. But despite her formal training, Julianne fell into the attractive actress' trap of the mid-1980's: TV soaps and miniseries. She appeared briefly in the daytime serial The Edge of Night (1956) and from 1985 to 1988 she played two half-sisters Frannie and Sabrina on the soap As the World Turns (1956). This performance later led to an Outstanding Ingénue Daytime Emmy Award in 1988. Her subsequent appearances were in mostly forgettable TV-movies, such as Money, Power, Murder. (1989), The Last to Go (1991) and Cast a Deadly Spell (1991).
She made her entrance into the big screen with 1990's Tales from the Darkside: The Movie (1990), where she played the victim of a mummy. Two years later, Julianne appeared in feature films with supporting parts in The Hand That Rocks the Cradle (1992) and the comedy The Gun in Betty Lou's Handbag (1992). She kept winning better and more powerful roles as time went on, including a small but memorable role as a doctor who spots Kimble Harrison Ford and attempts to thwart his escape in The Fugitive (1993). (A role that made such an impression on Steven Spielberg that he cast her in the Jurassic Park (1993) sequel without an audition in 1997). In one of Moore's most distinguished performances, she recapitulated her "beguiling Yelena" from Andre Gregory's workshop version of Chekhov's Uncle Vanya in Louis Malle's critically acclaimed Vanya on 42nd Street (1994). Director Todd Haynes gave Julianne her first opportunity to take on a lead role in Safe (1995). Her portrayal of Carol White, an affluent L.A. housewife who develops an inexplicable allergic reaction to her environment, won critical praise as well as an Independent Spirit Award nomination.
Later that year she found her way into romantic comedy, co-starring as Hugh Grant's pregnant girlfriend in Nine Months (1995). Following films included Assassins (1995), where she played an electronics security expert targeted for death (next to Sylvester Stallone and Antonio Banderas) and Surviving Picasso (1996), where she played Dora Maar, one of the numerous lovers of Picasso (portrayed by her hero, Anthony Hopkins). A year later, after co-starring in Spielberg's The Lost World: Jurassic Park (1997), opposite Jeff Goldblum, a young and unknown director, Paul Thomas Anderson asked Julianne to appear in his movie, Boogie Nights (1997). Despite her misgivings, she finally was won over by the script and her decision to play the role of Amber Waves, a loving porn star who acts as a mother figure to a ragtag crew, proved to be a wise one, since she received both Golden Globe and Academy Award nominations. Julianne started 1998 by playing an erotic artist in The Big Lebowski (1998), continued with a small role in the social comedy Chicago Cab (1997) and ended with a subtle performance in Gus Van Sant's remake of Psycho (1960). 1999 had Moore as busy as an actress can be.
As the century closed, Julianne starred in a number of high-profile projects, beginning with Robert Altman's Cookie's Fortune (1999) , in which she was cast as the mentally challenged but adorable sister of a decidedly unhinged Glenn Close. A portrayal of the scheming Mrs. Cheveley followed in Oliver Parker's An Ideal Husband (1999) with a number of critics asserting that Moore was the best part of the movie. She then enjoyed another collaboration with director Anderson in Magnolia (1999) and continued with an outstanding performance in The End of the Affair (1999), for which she garnered another Oscar nomination. She ended 1999 with another great performance, that of a grieving mother in A Map of the World (1999), opposite Sigourney Weaver.- Actress
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British actress Emily Kathleen Anne Mortimer was born in Hammersmith, London, England, to writer and barrister Sir John Mortimer and his second wife, Penelope (née Gollop). She was educated at St Paul's Girls' School in West London, and it was whilst there she began acting. Mortimer moved on from school to Lincoln College, Oxford University, where she studied English Literature and Russian, and spent two terms at the Moscow Arts Theater Drama School, studying acting.
While appearing in an Oxford University student production, Mortimer was spotted by a TV producer who cast her in an adaptation of Catherine Cookson' s The Glass Virgin (1995). She made her feature film debut in 1996 alongside Val Kilmer in The Ghost and the Darkness (1996). Roles in various projects have followed, including Elizabeth (1998), Love's Labour's Lost (2000), Match Point (2005), Lars and the Real Girl (2007), Shutter Island (2010) and Hugo (2011).
During the making of Love's Labour's Lost (2000), Mortimer met her husband Alessandro Nivola. The couple have two children, Sam Nivola and May Nivola.- Actress
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Moretz is best known for her work in the sci-fi thriller series The Peripheral, created by Scott B. Smith; the Mattson Tomlin-directed sci-fi thriller Mother/Android; Neil Jordan's thriller Greta; Roseanne Liang's Shadow in the Cloud, which claimed the Midnight Madness People's Choice Award at the Toronto Film Festival in 2020; The Miseducation of Cameron Post, which won both critical acclaim and the Grand Jury Prize at Sundance 2018; Luca Guadagnino's Suspiria, which went on to claim the Independent Spirit Awards' Robert Altman Award after world premiering in Venice; MGM's The Amityville Horror; Marc Webb's 500 Days of Summer; the Kick-Ass franchise; Matt Reeves' English-language remake of Let Me In; Martin Scorsese's Oscar winner Hugo; Warner Bros' If I Stay and Dark Shadows; Kimberly Peirce's remake of the Stephen King classic Carrie; and Sony's The Equalizer with Denzel Washington. She also exec produced the Snapchat Discover series Coming Out, which premiered in 2021.- Actress
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Megan is an only child born in Los Angeles, California. Her mother, Martha, was a model, and her father, Carter Mullally Jr., was a contract player for Paramount. Megan first entered Northwestern University intending to study acting, but switched to English literature. However, she still ended up starring in several campus musicals, which gained attention from producers and prompted her to drop out of school. In 1985, she moved to Los Angeles with no particular success. But, in 1994, she co-starred in "Grease" on Broadway with Rosie O'Donnell and, in 1995, in "How To Succeed In Business" with Matthew Broderick. Her star has been rising ever since. Her band Nancy and Beth have recorded two albums and tour extensively. She has directed four music videos for Nancy and Beth, which can be found at nancyandbeth.com.- Actress
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Stephanie March was born on 23 July 1974 in Dallas, Texas, USA. She is an actress and producer, known for The Invention of Lying (2009), Mr. & Mrs. Smith (2005) and Law & Order: Special Victims Unit (1999). She has been married to Dan Benton since 1 September 2017. She was previously married to Bobby Flay.- Donna Michelle was born on 8 December 1945 in Los Angeles, California, USA. She was an actress, known for Beach Blanket Bingo (1965), One Spy Too Many (1966) and The Man from U.N.C.L.E. (1964). She was married to David M. Ronne. She died on 10 April 2004.
- Lee Meredith was born on 22 October 1947 in River Edge, New Jersey, USA. She is an actress, known for The Producers (1967), Great Performances (1971) and The Sunshine Boys (1975). She has been married to Bert Stratford since 1969. They have two children.
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Rebecca Mader was born in Cambridge, Cambridgeshire, England as Rebecca Leigh Mader. She is an actress and writer, known for The Devil Wears Prada (2006), Iron Man Three (2013), Once Upon A Time (2014-2018) and Lost (2008-2010). She has been married to Marcus Kayne since November 23, 2016. She was previously married to Joseph Arongino.- Actress
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Madison McKinley is known for The Wolf of Wall Street (2013), Orange Is the New Black (2013) and Molly's Game (2017).- Signed on as a Warner Brothers starlet, bouncy, blonde-coiffed Diane McBain would develop a burgeoning career as lively '60s "bad girl" and "spoiled rich girl" types on film and TV. Born in Cleveland, Ohio on May 18, 1941, the family moved to California while still young and she started things off as a "sweet 16" model in print and commercial ads. Eventually TV got more than just a glimpse of this diverting beauty after a WB talent agent spotted her in a Los Angeles play and signed her on during her senior year at Glendale High School.
After busily apprenticing on various TV projects, Diane made her first big splash in 1960 (age 19) with a prominent role in Ice Palace (1960) co-starring Richard Burton, Carolyn Jones and Martha Hyer. Brimming with style and confidence, Diane was quickly ushered into other films as Warner's answer to Carroll Baker, winning parts in two consecutive soapers. The first was Parrish (1961) with beef-cake film star Troy Donahue and screen legend Claudette Colbert; the other was the title role in Claudelle Inglish (1961) opposite up-and-comers Chad Everett and Robert Logan. Neither the tawdry scripts nor the box office receipts were anything to write home about unfortunately, and her leading lady career in films started to flounder with such fodder as The Caretakers (1963) with Joan Crawford, A Distant Trumpet (1964), yet again with Donahue, and Spinout (1966). The last was one of Elvis Presley' later vehicles that signified an inevitable fadeout was on the horizon. Significantly better was her dizzy good time girl and socialite "Daphne Dutton" on the hip Warner Bros. series Surfside 6 (1960) alongside Van Williams (later TV's "Green Hornet") and Donohue. The show ran for two seasons.
Diane proved popular with the teen set with her devilish débutantes and snobby sophisticates, even accompanying Bob Hope on one of his USO tours of South Vietnam in 1966/67. On the cult series Batman (1966), she played "Pinky Pinkston" (with pink hair, pink outfits and a pink dog). By the late 1960s, however, her career began drifting into exploitation with terrible titles like I Sailed to Tahiti with an All Girl Crew (1969), Maryjane (1968) and The Mini-Skirt Mob (1968) (miscast as a biker chick) representative of what she was being handed.
Diane instead lay low for a time focusing instead on her child, Evan Burke, more or less splitting from the Hollywood scene. A few plays (Amanda in "The Glass Menagerie") and low budget films came her way, and in the 1980s she was seen a bit more on daytime soaps. The still young-looking and ever-elegant Diane was out and about in the 1990s as well, playing good-looking grandmas on such shows as Sabrina the Teenage Witch (1996). The victim of a rape attack in 1982, Diane chose to rise above her traumatic circumstances and help others as a rape counselor. - Actress
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Mary McDonnell is a two-time Oscar®-nominated actress, who is known for her character portrayals in both period and present-day screen roles, as well as a long history of stage and film roles.
Mary Eileen McDonnell was born on April 28, 1952 in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, to Eileen (Mundy) and John McDonnell, a computer consultant, both of Irish descent. Raised in Ithaca, New York, she graduated from the State University of New York (SUNY) at Fredonia. She later attended drama school and was accepted into the prestigious Long Wharf Theatre Company on the East Coast. Two decades later, she landed her breakthrough film role, in Kevin Costner's Dances with Wolves (1990), playing "Stands with a Fist", a white woman raised by the Sioux Indians. She earned her first Academy Award nomination for the role.
McDonnell's film credits include the Lawrence Kasdan films Grand Canyon (1991) and Mumford (1999) (opposite such seasoned performers as Robert Redford, Sidney Poitier, and Ben Kingsley); Roland Emmerich's Independence Day (1996) (starring Will Smith); acclaimed art house cult-hit Donnie Darko (2001); and Margin Call (2011) (opposite Kevin Spacey), which earned her the Robert Altman Award at the 2012 Independent Spirit Awards. On the small screen, McDonnell starred in four seasons on the Syfy Network's award-winning series Battlestar Galactica (2004) in her critically praised performance as President Laura Roslin. She garnered an Emmy nomination for her recurring guest role on the television series ER (1994). She stars as Captain Sharon Raydor on the TNT's hit drama series Major Crimes (2012), the follow-up to The Closer (2005), in which McDonnell originated the role and for which she earned a Primetime Emmy® nomination. She garnered a Best Actress Academy Award® nomination and a Golden Globe nomination for her portrayal of a paraplegic soap opera star in John Sayles's critically acclaimed film, Passion Fish (1992).
McDonnell began her career in theatre and has starred in a wide variety of both Broadway and off-Broadway productions. She received an Obie Award for her performance in Emily Mann's Still Life and has starred in off-Broadway productions including the debut production of Sam Shepard's Pulitzer Prize-winning Buried Child (off-Broadway), John Patrick Shanley Savage in Limbo, John O'Keefe's All Night Long, Michael Cristofer's Black Angel, Kathleen Tolan's A Weekend Near Madison, Paula Cizmar's Death of a Miner, and Dennis McIntyre's National Anthem. Her Broadway credits include Tennessee Williams' Summer and Smoke, the title role in Wendy Wasserstein's Pulitzer Prize-winning The Heidi Chronicles, and Emily Mann's Execution of Justice. She received rave reviews for her performance opposite David Strathairn in Emily Mann's acclaimed adaptation of Chekhov's classic, The Cherry Orchard.
McDonnell lives in Pacific Palisades, Los Angeles County, California with her husband, actor Randle Mell, and their children, Olivia and Michael.- Irish actress Katie McGrath did not intend to make a career for herself in the acting profession. Upon graduating from Trinity College in Dublin she became interested in fashion journalism and worked for lifestyle and fashion magazine, Image. She left after a while, as it was not her calling. After this, her mother's best friend, an assistant director, helped get her a job as a wardrobe assistant on the series The Tudors (2007). Whilst working on the production some of the staff suggested she try acting. A cast driver on the series passed her a list with the actors' agents on it, so she wrote and sent photos to them, and was signed shortly after.
In television, she is best known for portraying Morgana on the BBC One series Merlin (2008-2012), Lucy Westenra on the British-American series Dracula (2013-2014), Sarah Bennett in the first season of the Canadian horror anthology series Slasher (2016) and for her role as Lena Luthor on the American superhero series Supergirl (2016). Her film roles include Lady Thelma Furness in the drama film W.E. (2011), Zara with one of the most iconic scenes in the whole franchise in the science fiction adventure film Jurassic World (2015) and Elsa in the epic fantasy film King Arthur: Legend of the Sword (2017).
McGrath was raised in Ashford, County Wicklow, Ireland, by Paul, who works with computers, and Mary, who works for an Irish designer. She has two older brothers, Sean, an online media manager, and Rory, who is a post-production producer. She studied the International Baccalaureate at St. Andrew's College before graduating from Trinity College, Dublin with a degree in history with a focus in Russian history.
McGrath was cast in Damage, an Irish TV-movie in 2007. She also starred in the play La Marea at the Dublin Theatre Festival in the same year. She appeared in the feature films Eden and Freakdog in 2008, before being cast as Morgana Pendragon in Merlin.
In 2009, McGrath starred in a five-part docudrama for Channel 4 exploring the life of Queen Elizabeth II, The Queen, in which she played a young Princess Margaret. Emilia Fox portrayed Elizabeth II in the same episode in which McGrath appeared; the two had previously worked together as sisters Morgause and Morgana in Merlin. In 2010, McGrath was cast in Madonna's directorial debut W.E., an Edward VIII biopic. McGrath played Lady Furness, the king's former mistress who introduces him to Wallis Simpson.
2011 saw McGrath film the comedy-drama A Princess for Christmas in Romania. In September 2011, McGrath lent her voice to the characters in the Irish animated short film Tríd an Stoirm (Through the Storm). Later that month, McGrath was cast as Oriane Congost in Labyrinth.
McGrath was reunited with her The Tudors co-star and friend Jonathan Rhys Meyers in NBC and Sky Living's horror drama TV series Dracula; she portrayed Lucy Westenra. In June 2013, McGrath co-starred in episode four of the Channel 4 show Dates as a young lesbian on the dating scene alongside Gemma Chan. In November 2014, McGrath co-starred in a Hozier music video for the song "From Eden".
In 2015, McGrath had a supporting role as Zara in the film Jurassic World and starred in the Crackle original spy-thriller, The Throwaways.
McGrath portrayed the lead role in the first season of Chiller's original horror series Slasher, which premiered on 4 March 2016.
In 2016, it was announced that McGrath would play the recurring role of Lena Luthor in the second season of Supergirl. She appeared in the season two premiere episode entitled "The Adventures of Supergirl" and was promoted to a series regular in March 2017 for the third season. She appeared as Elsa in Guy Ritchie's fantasy film King Arthur: Legend of the Sword, which was released in May 2017.
In 2016-2017 McGrath was featured in the first two seasons of Frontier, alongside Jason Momoa. In 2019 she starred in the Australian TV show Bridesmaids, alongside Georgina Haig and Abbie Cornish. In 2020 McGrath narrated the audio book for Islands of Mercy by Rose Tremain.
After wrapping up the sixth and final season of Supergirl in 2021, McGrath traveled to Budapest, where she shot the John Wick spin-off series The Continental. McGrath can be seen as The Adjudicator in The Continental, which aired its three episodes in 2023. - Actress
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New York City-born Erin Moriarty launched her acting career in a way many hopefuls dream of: with an awards-recognized project. Erin first appeared on screen in the Emmy-nominated soap opera One Life to Live (1968) in 2010, playing the character Whitney Bennett in six episodes. In 2011 she built on her TV work with a guest role in an episode of Law & Order: Special Victims Unit (1999).
The following year, Erin landed a small part in her first feature film. Acting alongside Ben Stiller, Vince Vaughn and Jonah Hill, she appeared in the sci-fi comedy The Watch (2012). In 2013, she took another supporting gig in a movie. The coming-of-age drama The Kings of Summer (2013) follows three teenagers who hatch a plan to part ways with their parents and live off the land in a house built by themselves. Portraying Natalie Walraven, the daughter of Radha Mitchell's character, Erin also worked on the 2013 TV series Red Widow (2013).
She stayed in TV in 2014 and played the daughter of Woody Harrelson's hard character Marty Hart in the first season of the Emmy-winning and Golden Globe-nominated True Detective (2014). It was a role that required her to appear in three episodes. Since the show wrapped, Erin has said playing a Goth was "fun... because it's the opposite of how I present myself, and is the opposite of any role I'd been considered for." In 2015, Erin landed a recurring guest role on hit Netflix crime action series Jessica Jones (2015). In 2016's Captain Fantastic (2016), starring Viggo Mortensen, she played the supporting role of Claire in the film festival favorite about the changing dynamics of a unique family. Erin followed that up with the action thriller Blood Father (2016), starring Mel Gibson and William H. Macy. She went on to play a starring role as Kelly in the biopic The Miracle Season (2018) (2018), alongside Helen Hunt. As of 2019, she is co-starring in Amazon Prime's 'The Boys'.