Lisa Picard is Famous 2001 premiere
Wednesday August 15th, Cinépolis Chelsea 260 W 23rd St, New York, NY 10011
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- Actor
- Director
- Producer
Griffin Dunne was born on June 8, 1955 in New York City, the oldest child of Dominick Dunne, a producer, actor, and writer, and Ellen Beatriz (Griffin) Dunne, an activist. His sister was actress Dominique Dunne. He grew up mainly in Los Angeles, California and attended school in Colorado before moving back to New York in the late 1970s. As an actor, Dunne has the distinction of having starred in two 1980s cult favorites. First came the John Landis monster movie An American Werewolf in London (1981), then the Martin Scorsese black comedy After Hours (1985). After Hours is also among the movies that Dunne has produced with partner Amy Robinson through their company Double Play Productions. Other Double Play productions include Running on Empty (1988), White Palace (1990) and Once Around (1991). Dunne has continued to appear on both sides of the camera, taking supporting roles as an actor in films like My Girl (1991) and I Like It Like That (1994). He made his directorial debut with a short film, Duke of Groove (1995), which was nominated for an Oscar.
Dunne then made the leap to feature films with Addicted to Love (1997), Practical Magic (1998), Lisa Picard Is Famous (2000) and Fierce People (2005). Dunne produced and starred in the film Game 6 (2005), which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in 2005.
Griffin's ancestry is Irish (from his father) and Irish, English, German, Mexican, and Swedish (from his mother).- Producer
- Additional Crew
- Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
Dominick Dunne was born on 29 October 1925 in Hartford, Connecticut, USA. He was a producer and assistant director, known for Addicted to Love (1997), Playhouse 90 (1956) and The Panic in Needle Park (1971). He was married to Ellen Beatriz Griffin Dunne. He died on 26 August 2009 in Manhattan, New York City, New York, USA.- Writer
- Actor
- Producer
Jay McInerney was born on 13 January 1955 in Hartford, Connecticut, USA. He is a writer and actor, known for Gia (1998), Bright Lights, Big City and Brightness Falls. He has been married to Anne Hearst since 21 November 2006. He was previously married to Helen Bransford, Merry Reymond and Linda Rossiter.- Actor
- Writer
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Jonathan Michael Lovitz is a American comedian and actor from Tarzana who is known for voicing Jay Sherman from The Critic and for being a Saturday Night Live cast member in the 1990s. He acted in a lot of Adam Sandler films such as The Wedding Singer, Little Nicky, Hotel Transylvania, Grown Ups 2 and Eight Crazy Nights.- Actor
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Fisher Stevens moved from his native Chicago to New York at the age of 13 to pursue an acting career. He tried, unsuccessfully, to get any kind of job and was, he recalls, even rejected as extra for a Crest commercial.
When his acting teacher, Dan Fauci, lost the lease to his teaching studio, he rented Fisher's loft and built a stage in the living room. He later studied with Uta Hagen. His first professional theatrical production was playing Tiny Tim's brother, Harry, in the musical version of Dickens' "A Christmas Carol" in the basement of an off-off-off Broadway theatre when he was 14. Since then he has performed in more than 20 stage productions including 544 performances in Harvey Fierstein's "Torch Song Triology", both on and off Broadway. He also played Eugene in Neil Simon's "Brighton Beach Memories". Most recently, he played the leads in Thomas Babe's "Carrying School Children", "Almost Romance" opposite Helen Slater and Jules Feiffer's "Little Murders" with Christine Lahti. He also sang and danced in the musicals "Miami" by Wendy Wasserstein and the late Michael Bennett's Broadway production of "Scandal" with Swoosie Kurtz and Treat Williams. He also appeared in the recent New York City Shakespeare Festival production of "A Midsummer Nights Dream".
Fisher made his motion picture debut getting his fingers chopped off in the horror film The Burning (1981) when he was 16-years-old. After that he appeared in Baby It's You (1983) and The Brother from Another Planet (1984). He co-starred with Matt Dillon in the hit comedy film The Flamingo Kid (1984) where he met the then fledgling producer Gary Foster. He appeared as sidekick to Steve Guttenberg's character in Short Circuit (1986).
In television he has performed in ABC's Ryan's Hope (1975), Showtime's Tall Tales & Legends (1985) and CBS' Early Edition (1996).
Despite having lived in New York City for more than a decade, where, with some other actors, Stevens has started an off-off-off Broadway theatre company called Naked Angels, he insists that he is still a fan of the Chicago Cubs.- Actor
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Frank Whaley is a critically acclaimed actor/writer/director. He is best known for the films Pulp Fiction (1994) and Swimming with Sharks (1994), and has worked with Oliver Stone multiple times. His feature directorial debut, Joe the King (1999), earned him the Waldo Salt Screenwriting prize at the 1999 Sundance Film Festival. He was born in Syracuse, New York, and resides in New York City. He is also an accomplished stage actor, working frequently with the New Group theater. Frank is married to the writer Heather Whaley. They have two children.- Actress
- Producer
Heather Whaley is known for Winning the City, The Jimmy Show (2001) and Like Sunday, Like Rain (2014). She has been married to Frank Whaley since 5 May 2001. They have two children.- Actor
- Producer
- Director
Blessed with a piercing, blue-eyed glint, brawny looks, cocky "tough guy" stance and effortless charisma, TV's Christopher Meloni has grabbed audiences' attention, male and female alike, finding breakthrough small screen stardom playing both sides of the law. Audiences first were taken in by his sexually arresting portrayal of a sociopathic killer in the gripping prison drama Oz (1997) on cable TV. Although his small screen roots were in 90s situation comedy, the network powers-that-be wisely discovered his power and allure as a dramatic star and quickly handed him his own prime-time crime series, Law & Order: Special Victims Unit (1999), as a not-quite-by-the-book crime detective. This one-two punch of "Oz" and Law & Order: Special Victims Unit (1999) put Meloni, who seems to grow sexier with age, on the map and well on top, where he remains today.
Christopher Peter Meloni was born on April 2, 1961, in Washington, D.C., the son of Cecile (Chagnon) and Charles Robert Meloni, an endocrinologist. Of Italian and French-Canadian parentage, he attended St. Stephen's School and played quarterback for his high school team. Developing an interest in acting rather early in life, he attended the University of Colorado at Boulder following high school graduation. He initially majored in acting but wound up earning a degree in history in 1983. Acting won out in the long run, however, and Chris relocated to New York where he studied with acting guru Sanford Meisner at the renowned Neighborhood Playhouse. Supplementing his income during these lean years by taking advantage of his powerful physique (as construction worker, bouncer, personal trainer), Meloni worked his way up the acting ladder via parts in commercials.
With a full head of hair in the early days, he broke into series TV in 1989, the first being the already-established cable football comedy 1st & Ten (1984). In this sitcom, which was HBO's very first back in 1984, Chris played ex-con quarterback Vito Del Greco (aka "Johnny Gunn"). The series' star Delta Burke had already left the cast by the time Chris came aboard in its final season. A second sitcom arrived almost immediately with the stereotypical Italian family sitcom The Fanelli Boys (1990) featuring Chris as dim-eyed, skirt-chasing Frankie Fanelli, one of the four "dees, dem and dos" sons of Brooklynite widow Theresa Fanelli (Ann Morgan Guilbert). Despite a strong, boisterous cast, the show was painfully obvious and met an early demise. True to nature, Chris gave voice and added to the fun as a cocky, mooching high school teen who knows the "how to's" of attracting pretty girl dinos in the animated prehistoric series Dinosaurs (1991).
He also made a manly mark in mini-movies with co-starring roles in such "women" dramas as In a Child's Name (1991) starring Valerie Bertinelli, Something to Live for: The Alison Gertz Story (1992), which top-lined Molly Ringwald, Without a Kiss Goodbye (1993) as the caring husband of Lisa Hartman, and the Connie Sellecca starrer A Dangerous Affair (1995). An interchangeable ability to convey both heartfelt sympathy and virile menace did not go by unnoticed. After minor parts on the big screen with Clean Slate (1994), Junior (1994) and 12 Monkeys (1995), Chris drew strong notices in the featured role of gangster Johnnie Marzzone in the classic neo-noir Bound (1996), which earned cult status for its sexually-charged lesbian sub-storyline.
A tough recurring part on NYPD Blue (1993), a typical mafia role in the mini-series The Last Don (1997) and another short-lived comedic series lead (Leaving L.A. (1997)) finally led to a big payoff in the brutal and brilliant cable series Oz (1997). Christopher's introduction to the Oz prison as bisexual psychopath Chris Keller was powerhouse casting and he drew immediate notice and critical applause into the show's second season. Unflinching in its blood-soaked presentation of life behind bars, Chris' raw animal magnetism was unparalleled on the show and his steamy, erotic couplings with another male prisoner on screen promoted him swiftly to gay icon status. Undaunted by the possible career-damaging effects that could occur, Chris' frank acceptance and acknowledgment was admirable indeed and his outright support of human rights causes earned him high marks.
The father of two (daughter Sophia Eva Pietra (born March 23, 2001), and son Dante Amadeo (born January 2, 2004), he has been married since 1995 to production designer 'Sherman Williams' (The Dark Backward (1991)). Chris' sudden burst of cable notoriety earned him his own prime time NBC series. With the veteran "Law & Order" program developing a sister spin-off, Law & Order: Special Victims Unit (1999), Meloni raised the bar with his trenchant pairing with co-star Mariska Hargitay as partners of a special victims crime unit. Despite the show's reality-driven approach, Meloni and Hargitay's dynamite chemistry carried the show to a new level. Allowing their characters' more serious flaws to surface, Meloni, in particular, managed to convey Detective Stabler's private pain and personal turmoil with a raw poignancy. Both he and Hargitay have been honored with Emmy award nominations for their work here (she has won). Occasionally appearing on stage, Chris' theater credits include "The Rainmaker" (as Starbuck) (1998) and "Comers" (1998), both at the Williamstown Theatre Festival. He earned standout reviews as Eddie Carbone in Arthur Miller's "A View from the Bridge," which he performed at Dublin's Gate Theatre in 2005. In 2006 he joined the campy proceedings at an Actors' Fund of America Benefit of the soap opera spoof "Die, Mommie Die!" starring drag illusionist and "Oz" alumnus Charles Busch.
Going well over a decade's worth of service to the series that made him a household name, Meloni finally retired his TV detective in 2011. Throughout the show's run he continued to flaunt his humorous side, showing up on such parody shows as Mad TV (1995) and cracking up on the various night time TV haunts. On film he continues to shatter his dramatic image in such fare as The Souler Opposite (1998), Wet Hot American Summer (2001), Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle (2004) and its sequel Harold & Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay (2008). While he has not found outright stardom on the big screen (he has nominally played "other man" roles in such popular films as Runaway Bride (1999) and Nights in Rodanthe (2008)), Chris has more than proved his staying power since he left the popular series.
More recently, he moved forward as a writer/producer/director/star of the comedy film Dirty Movie (2011), which also has in its cast "L&O: SVU" co-star Diane Neal. In addition, Chris supplied the voice of DC Comics classic character Hal Jordan (aka Green Lantern) in the animated movie Green Lantern: First Flight (2009). He also has held regular roles on the series True Blood (2008) in 2012 and Surviving Jack (2014) as well as strong cinematic parts in the Superman film Man of Steel (2013) and in Small Time (2014).- Actress
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Mariska (Ma-rish-ka) Magdolna Hargitay was born on January 23, 1964, in Santa Monica, California. Her parents are Mickey Hargitay and Jayne Mansfield. She is the youngest of their three children. In June 1967, Mariska and her brothers Zoltan and Mickey Jr. were in the back seat of a car when it was involved in the fatal accident which killed her mother. The children escaped with minor injuries. Her father remarried a stewardess named Ellen, and they raised the three children and gave them a normal childhood. They also financially supported the children, since Jayne Mansfield's debt-ridden estate left no money for them.
Mariska majored in theater at UCLA. Her first motion picture feature was the cult favorite, Ghoulies (1984), where she gave a memorable performance as Donna. Unlike her mother Jayne, who had changed her name, her hair color, and did nude pictorials to become a star, Mariska took a very different approach on her journey to become a star. She rejected advice to change her name and appearance. And she refused to copy her mother's sexy image by turning down nude scenes in her next film Jocks (1986). She told casting directors that she was her own person when she held onto her dark locks and athletic figure, when they were expecting another blond, buxom Jayne Mansfield. Mariska continued with her acting classes and waited on tables, while she landed forgettable roles in short-lived television shows. She appeared a few times on the nighttime soap Falcon Crest (1981). She also appeared in the hit film Leaving Las Vegas (1995), credited as 'Hooker at the bar', and in the flop film Lake Placid (1999) as Myra Okubo. Her recurring role on the top-rated show ER (1994) in 1998 gave her career enough of a jolt to land her the starring role of Det. Olivia Benson in Law & Order: Special Victims Unit (1999), the first spin off from the excellent franchise of Law & Order (1990). The hour-long show deals with sex crimes and the detectives who solve these cases. Mariska played Olivia as a tough, compassionate detective, who did action scenes and her own stunt work. She reaped the rewards from the hit TV show, after struggling and studying her craft for fifteen years. She became the highest paid actress on television, and she won Emmy and Golden Globe awards for her performance. The show also changed her personal life, since she met her husband actor Peter Hermann on the set and married him on August 28, 2004. That same year, she appeared in the television movie Plain Truth (2004), in which she played attorney Ellie Harrison. Mariska became an activist, when fans of her show who were abused, would write to her, and she founded a non-profit organization called "Joyful Heart Foundation" to help "survivors of sexual assault, domestic violence, and child abuse."
Mariska gave birth to her son August in 2006. But that tremendous joy was soon followed by tremendous sadness when her beloved father Mickey died just two months later at the age of 80. Mariska and her husband Peter adopted two children, a girl named Amaya, and a boy named Andrew, within a span of few months in 2011.
Mariska speaks English, Hungarian, French, Spanish, and Italian, and her husband also speaks several languages, including his native language German. They divide their time between New York and Los Angeles.- Kimmi Kappenberg was born on 11 November 1972 in East Setauket, Long Island, New York, USA. She has been married to Kevin Caminske since August 2004. They have two children.
- David was born on Long Island, New York, and has a younger sister named Betsy and an older sister named Helen, who is also a gifted actor. The family moved to Illinois when David was four and moved all around the suburbs of Chicago - Evanston, Northbrook, Aurora, and finally Naperville when the town was nothing more than a suburban farming town of 27,000 people. Going to public school all his years, he kicked around with the guys of his youth, many of whom he still keeps up with. Every summer from the age of 12 was a working summer, saving for college that only lasted five weeks before he was kicked out.
He met Ken Stien when he was 11. Ken was a local horseman who trained horses and riders alike. Being a transplant and a veteran like David's father, they all fit in together. Ken became a mentor and lifelong friend. Teenage drinking and mild drug abuse colored David's youth with several run-ins with the local police. Trouble followed him for many years before he got straight.
Acting was somewhat of a natural progression. Working for the first time at the age of 12 in a community theater project, he landed a part, not in some cutesy kid story or clown play or happy-happy show, but a production of Kurt Vonnegut's "Happy Birthday, Wanda June" directed by Dale Bowers. The piece was pretty risqué for a small town and walkouts abounded due to language and subject matter. The local critic was very taken by David's presence, and thus provided David's first and only positive review. A few more small local plays and musicals followed, but time and adolescence took him to different places. High school was typically unremarkable, with less than average grades and anger on the menu for those years, leading to an undesired distinction of class clown in the class of '82, which upon receiving, he 'flipped off' the class and administration. The University of Iowa had accepted him, and he decided to pursue study in the field of social work.
Moving back to Naperthrill, he moved into an apartment above an abandoned car dealership and took several different jobs -driving auto parts, doing road construction, and finally enlisting into the United States Marine Corps reserves and letting that wash over him. The intense mandate laid before all recruits - that they must learn to toe the line and suck it up, and learn respect for others and then themselves - had a deep impact on him and followed him in all aspects of life.
Dennis Rosa put him in the chorus of a Chicago hit musical, "One Shining Moment" starring Megan Mullally, Kevin Anderson, and Alan Ruck. After the show's run, David had misgivings about his new profession and didn't quite feel accredited to be in it, having stumbled into the audition while the Chicago school district was on strike and he had no class. He applied and was accepted to the American Academy of Dramatic Arts. That decision took him to New York City. They were good days in the city, filled with a pace and energy he could now relate to; ironies abounded in the city, which had no time for its dead, nor patience for sentimentality. A friend simply 'by example' led him to sobriety. Reading plays and lacking any real substantial work, it was years before anything of note came his way. Reading "Six Degrees of Separation" was the first time he discovered, like others, that John Guare had written a great play. He read for several parts first but it was the part of the nameless "hustler" that he knew he had to play and so "serve" this story. Years went by, and little jobs in the theater followed, but most of the years were spent in East Harlem on 109th and 1st paying the bills with carpentry jobs and paint crews. He then stumbled into a friendship with Al Noccella, his partner in construction and beneficiary who kept him employed and ushered him out when it looked like the "break" had come.
The character Steve in "Sex and the City" came after many auditions for many parts on the show and lasted for almost five years. At a USO gala event, he met Chrysti, an Army specialist working the gate at Fort Monroe, Virginia, and through a whole long, bizarre, and weird series of events and lies, hooked his life to a woman that really meant the world to him. - Actress
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Scarlett Ingrid Johansson was born on November 22, 1984 in Manhattan, New York City, New York. Her mother, Melanie Sloan is from a Jewish family from the Bronx and her father, Karsten Johansson is a Danish-born architect from Copenhagen. She has a sister, Vanessa Johansson, who is also an actress, a brother, Adrian, a twin brother, Hunter Johansson, born three minutes after her, and a paternal half-brother, Christian. Her grandfather was writer Ejner Johansson.
Johansson began acting during childhood, after her mother started taking her to auditions. She made her professional acting debut at the age of eight in the off-Broadway production of "Sophistry" with Ethan Hawke, at New York's Playwrights Horizons. She would audition for commercials but took rejection so hard her mother began limiting her to film tryouts. She made her film debut at the age of nine, as John Ritter's character's daughter in the fantasy comedy North (1994). Following minor roles in Just Cause (1995), as the daughter of Sean Connery and Kate Capshaw's character, and If Lucy Fell (1996), she played the role of Amanda in Manny & Lo (1996). Her performance in Manny & Lo garnered a nomination for the Independent Spirit Award for Best Lead Female, and positive reviews, one noting, "[the film] grows on you, largely because of the charm of ... Scarlett Johansson", while San Francisco Chronicle critic Mick LaSalle commentated on her "peaceful aura", and wrote, "If she can get through puberty with that aura undisturbed, she could become an important actress."
After appearing in minor roles in Fall (1997) and Home Alone 3 (1997), Johansson garnered widely spread attention for her performance in The Horse Whisperer (1998), directed by Robert Redford, where she played Grace MacLean, a teenager traumatized by a riding accident. She received a nomination for the Chicago Film Critics Association Award for Most Promising Actress for the film. In 1999, she appeared in My Brother the Pig (1999) and in the music video for Mandy Moore's single, "Candy". Although the film was not a box office success, she received praise for her breakout role in Ghost World (2001), credited with "sensitivity and talent [that] belie her age". She was also featured in the Coen Brothers' dark drama The Man Who Wasn't There (2001), opposite Billy Bob Thornton and Frances McDormand. She appeared in the horror comedy Eight Legged Freaks (2002) with David Arquette and Kari Wuhrer.
In 2003, she was nominated for two Golden Globe Awards, one for drama (Girl with a Pearl Earring (2003)) and one for comedy (Lost in Translation (2003)), her breakout role, starring opposite Bill Murray, and receiving rave reviews and a Best Actress Award at the Venice Film Festival. Her film roles include the critically acclaimed Weitz brothers' film In Good Company (2004), as well as starring opposite John Travolta in A Love Song for Bobby Long (2004), which garnered her a third Golden Globe Award nomination.
She dropped out of Mission: Impossible III (2006) due to scheduling conflicts. Her next film role was in The Island (2005) alongside Ewan McGregor which earned weak reviews from U.S. critics. After this, she appeared in Woody Allen's Match Point (2005) and was nominated again for a Golden Globe Award. In May 2008, she released her album "Anywhere I Lay My Head", a collection of Tom Waits covers featuring one original song. Also that year, she starred in Frank Miller's The Spirit (2008), the Woody Allen film Vicky Cristina Barcelona (2008), and played Mary Boleyn opposite Natalie Portman in The Other Boleyn Girl (2008).
Since then, she has appeared as part of an ensemble cast in the romantic comedy He's Just Not That Into You (2009), the action superhero film Iron Man 2 (2010), the comedy-drama We Bought a Zoo (2011) and starred as the original scream queen, Janet Leigh, in Hitchcock (2012). She then played her character, Black Widow, in the blockbuster action films The Avengers (2012), Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014), Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015), Captain America: Civil War (2016), Avengers: Infinity War (2018), Avengers: Endgame (2019) and Black Widow (2021), and also headlined the sci-fi action thriller Lucy (2014), a box office success. With more than a decade of work already under her belt, Scarlett has proven to be one of Hollywood's most talented young actresses. Her other starring roles are in the sci-fi action thriller Ghost in the Shell (2017) and the dark comedy Rough Night (2017).
Scarlett and Canadian actor Ryan Reynolds were engaged in May 2008 and married in September of that year. In 2010, the couple announced their separation, and subsequently divorced a year later. In 2013, she became engaged to French journalist Romain Dauriac, the couple married a year later. In January 2017, the couple announced their separation, and subsequently divorced in March of that year. They have a daughter, Rose Dorothy Dauriac (born 2014). The couple divorced in September 2017.
She married Colin Jost in October 2020. They have one child, a son.- Actor
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Chad Lowe is an American actor, director, and producer.
He was born Charles Davis Lowe II in Dayton, Ohio, to Barbara Lynn (Hepler), a school teacher, and Charles Davis Lowe, a trial lawyer. He is the younger brother of actor Rob Lowe. Chad first appeared opposite Rob in the movie Oxford Blues (1984), in which he played a computer hacker. He quickly followed this up with a starring role in Silence of the Heart (1984) opposite childhood friend and fellow actor Charlie Sheen. Silence of the Heart (1984) is a dark drama about the problems teenagers often face and the subsequent danger of suicide relating to these problems. It was the first film to properly address the subject. The film also features then up-and-coming actors Sherilyn Fenn and Casey Siemaszko.
There Must Be a Pony (1986), a drama shot for TV, saw Chad starring alongside Elizabeth Taylor and Robert Wagner. He then co-starred with Donald Sutherland and Mia Sara in the occult horror film Apprentice to Murder (1988). Chad saw the eighties out with the thriller True Blood (1989) with Jeff Fahey, James Tolkan, and Sherilyn Fenn.
Next, he and Tommy Lee Jones headlined the long-running Hallmark Hall of Fame (1951) anthology, in the TV Movie segment 'April Morning' (1987). The movie is based upon the novel by the late Howard Fast and is set during the American Revolution or American War of Independence (1775-1783).
He worked steadily throughout the nineties, acting in both TV and film. In 1990 he starred with David Soul and Edward Herrmann in the TV drama So Proudly We Hail (1990). The witty drama An Inconvenient Woman (1991) followed the next year. Chad then played Charlie Sykes in the oddball fantasy-comedy-horror road movie Highway to Hell (1991).
But his role as AIDS victim Jesse McKenna in Life Goes On (1989) (1991-1993) is perhaps his most well-known. He starred with Bill Smitrovich and Patti LuPone. His performance won him an Emmy Award.
In 2000 Chad played country and western legend John Denver in Take Me Home: The John Denver Story (2000), a movie based on the musician's life and book.
Chad then starred with Richard Gere and Diane Lane in the ambitious thriller, Unfaithful (2002). He has since clocked up over sixty film and TV roles including recurring roles in ER (1994) and 24 (2001) with Kiefer Sutherland.
Chad is married to Kim Painter and they have a daughter, Mabel.
He is (2010) starring in the hit TV series Pretty Little Liars (2010).- Actress
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Hilary was born in Lincoln, Nebraska, to Judith Kay (Clough), a secretary, and Stephen Michael Swank, who served in the National Guard and was also a traveling salesman. Her maternal grandmother, Frances Martha Dominguez, was of Mexican descent, and her other roots include German, English, and Scottish. During her early childhood, her family moved to Spokane, Washington, and when she was six, to Bellingham, Washington.
Hilary was discovered as a child by producer Suzy Sachs, who coached her in acting. When she was nine years old, she starred in her first play as "Mowgli" in "The Jungle Book". She began to appear regularly in local theater and school plays. She went to school in Bellingham, where she lived with her family, until she was 16. She competed in the Junior Olympics and Washington State championships in swimming; she ranked 5th in the state in all-around gymnastics (which would come in handy for starring in The Next Karate Kid (1994) years later). In 1990, Hilary and her mother moved to Los Angeles, where she enrolled in South Pasadena High School, and started acting professionally. She appeared in Buffy the Vampire Slayer (1992) but The Next Karate Kid (1994), where she got the part competing against hundreds of other actresses, was her breakout role. Ever since then, she has been much in demand and has worked non-stop in movies. She won the Best Actress Oscar for playing "Brandon Teena" in Boys Don't Cry (1999). In addition to the Oscar, Hilary won the Golden Globe Award for "Best Actress in a Drama" and "Best Actress" prizes from The New York Film Critics, The Los Angeles Film Critics, The Chicago Film Critics and The Broadcast Film Critics Association. She also won the "Breakthrough Performance" prize from The National Board of Review.
Hilary then appeared in supporting roles opposite Cate Blanchett and Keanu Reeves in Sam Raimi's The Gift (2000) and opposite Al Pacino and Robin Williams in Christopher Nolan's Insomnia (2002). Hilary then starred as "Alice Paul" in HBO's Iron Jawed Angels (2004), which told the story of the women's suffragist movement and she was honored with both SAG and Golden Globe nominations for her performance in this film. In 2004, Hilary starred opposite Clint Eastwood and Morgan Freeman as the title character in Eastwood's Million Dollar Baby (2004); the story of a young woman's quest to realize her dream of becoming a professional boxer. For this performance, she was honored with her second Academy Award for "Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role" and has garnered "Best Actress" prizes from the National Society of Film Critics, the Screen Actors Guild, The Broadcast Film Critics, and a Golden Globe for "Best Lead Actress in a Drama".
Hilary Swank is the third youngest woman in history to win two Academy Awards for "Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role".
She subsequently had a supporting role opposite Scarlett Johansson and Josh Hartnett in Brian De Palma's The Black Dahlia (2006), starred in Freedom Writers (2007), the true story of Long Beach schoolteacher, Erin Gruwell, The Reaping (2007) for Warner Brothers, and reunited with her Freedom Writers (2007) writer/director, Richard LaGravenese, starring in the film adaptation of Cecelia Ahern's novel, P.S. I Love You (2007).
An aficionado for anything that involves the outdoors, she enjoys: sky diving, river rafting and skiing.- Actor
- Writer
New York Theater credits include the original casts of Take Me Out (Broadway and NYPT), Antlia Phnematica and Betty's Summer Vacation (Playwrights Horizons). He recently toured in the National Tour of What The Constitution Means To Me.
Regionally he has performed leading roles at Portland Center Stage ,Two River Theater, ART, Westport Country Playhouse, Huntington Theater, Commonwealth Shakespeare, Pittsburgh Public, Repertory Theater of St Louis, Hartford TheaterWorks, Barrington Stage, Boise Contemporary Theater, The Kitchen Theater.
Nat co-wrote and co-starred in the film Lisa Picard Is Famous which was directed by Griffin Dunne. It premiered at the Canne Film Festival in 2000.
Recent film and television credits include A Most Violent Year, The Preppie Connection, We Are What We Are, Marvelous Mrs Maisel, House of Cards,Gotham, The Black List, Pan Am, Law & Order: SVU,
Graduate of Boston Conservatory and A.R.T. Institute at Harvard University. @natydw4 on Instagram- Actress
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Laura Kirk grew up in rural Kansas where she attended high school and got her degree in theater and film from the University of Kansas. In New York, she studied with Wynn Handman, Suzanne Esper, and improv with Alan Arkin.
Her debut was as co-writer and star in the critically acclaimed film Lisa Picard Is Famous, directed by Griffin Dunne. It premiered at the Cannes Film Festival and was featured in many international and American festivals. After its premiere at the Film Forum in New York City, Lisa Picard Is Famous was called "hilarious" by Stephen Holden of The New York Times and "squirmingly funny" by Owen Gleiberman of Entertainment Weekly. It is included in John Gaspard's book Fast, Cheap and Under Control ...Lessons Learned from the Greatest Low Budget Movies of All Time.
Laura has continued acting and producing independent films in Kansas where she now lives.- Actress
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Mira Katherine Sorvino was born on September 28, 1967 in Manhattan. She is the daughter of Lorraine Davis, an actress turned drama therapist, and veteran character actor Paul Sorvino. Her father's family were Italian immigrants. The young Sorvino was intelligent, an avid reader and an exceptional scholar. Her father discouraged her from becoming an actor, as he knew how the industry often chews up young stars. She attended Harvard, majoring in Chinese, graduating magna cum laude in 1989, largely on the strength of her thesis, a Hoopes Prize-winning thesis on racial conflict in China, written and researched during the year spent in Beijing, which helped her fluency in Mandarin Chinese.
However, she showed interest in a career in acting from an early age, and moved to New York City to try her hand in the City's film industry, waitressing, auditioning and working at the Tribeca production company of Robert De Niro. She succeeded in getting a little television work in the early 1990s, but got her first film job in the independent gangster movie Amongst Friends (1993), on which she worked her way up the ladder behind the camera to eventually associate-produce the film, and, more importantly, was eventually cast as the female lead. The indie production was well-received, and Sorvino's performance attracted enough buzz to get her cast in two more movies, one a more prominent indie, Barcelona (1994), the other her first Hollywood feature, Quiz Show (1994), and her skillful performances brought her yet more attention.
An exceptionally poised and articulate young woman, she may have seemed inappropriate to play a crazy hooker, but Woody Allen took the chance, and her magnificent performance as the female lead in his Mighty Aphrodite (1995) proved her range as a performer and earned her an Oscar (at the tender age of 29) for Best Supporting Actress. Since winning the Oscar, Sorvino has continued to take a wide range of roles, including another stretch as Marilyn Monroe in Norma Jean & Marilyn (1996), co-starring with another very intelligent and skilled young actress, Ashley Judd. Forays into action and horror, such as Mimic (1997) and The Replacement Killers (1998) show that Sorvino is not above being playful in the film roles she chooses.
However, what forever cemented her role in popular culture was her performance as charmingly silly California beach girl Romy White in Romy and Michele's High School Reunion (1997), in which she and co-star Lisa Kudrow utter one hilarious absurdity after another.
Mira Sorvino married Christopher Backus on June 11, 2004, and the couple have four children.- Marcus Schenkenberg was born on 4 August 1968 in Solna, Stockholms län, Sweden. He is an actor, known for Dinner Rush (2000), Meatballs and Macaroni (1988) and V.I.P. (1998).
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Paul Stephen Rudd was born in Passaic, New Jersey. His parents, Michael and Gloria, both from Jewish families, were born in the London area, U.K. He has one sister, who is three years younger than he is. Paul traveled with his family during his early years, because of his father's airline job at TWA. His family eventually settled in Overland Park, Kansas, where his mother worked as a sales manager for TV station KSMO-TV. Paul attended Broadmoor Junior High and Shawnee Mission West High School, from which he graduated in 1987, and where he was Student Body President. He then enrolled at the University of Kansas in Lawrence, majoring in theater. He graduated from the American Academy of Dramatic Arts-West in Los Angeles and participated in a three-month intensive workshop under the guidance of Michael Kahn at the British Drama Academy at Oxford University in Britain. Rudd helped to produce the Globe Theater's production of Howard Brenton's "Bloody Poetry," which starred Rudd as Percy Bysshe Shelley.- Actor
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As an Emmy and Golden Globe nominee, Rob Morrow is a critically acclaimed actor, writer, and director with an established career in television spanning over three decades.
Morrow starred in The Whole Truth (2010) opposite Maura Tierney. Produced by Jerry Bruckheimer, the legal drama chronicles how a case is built from the perspective of both the defense and the prosecution. The show aired Wednesday nights at 10:00PM on ABC.
On the big screen, Rob will next star in the independent film The Good Doctor (2011) opposite Orlando Bloom. He was recently seen in Rob Reiner's The Bucket List (2007) starring opposite Jack Nicholson and Morgan Freeman, which grossed over $170 million worldwide.
Morrow's other film credits include: Michael Hoffman's critically acclaimed film, The Emperor's Club (2002) opposite Kevin Kline; Robert Redford's Oscar-nominated film Quiz Show (1994) opposite Ralph Fiennes and John Turturro; Daisy von Scherler Mayer's The Guru (2002) opposite Heather Graham; Albert Brooks' comedy Mother (1996); Bruce Beresford's Last Dance (1996)opposite Sharon Stone; and Sean Smith and Anthony Stark's Into My Heart (1998) opposite Claire Forlani and Jake Weber.
Morrow recently starred on the long running CBS hit drama, Numb3rs (2005). He is also well known for his critically acclaimed portrayal of New York doctor gone-to Alaska, Joel Fleischman, on the hit television series, Northern Exposure (1990), which garnered him three Golden Globes and two Emmy Award nominations for "Best Actor in a Dramatic Series." He also starred on the critically acclaimed Showtime original television series, Street Time (2002).
His other television credits include starring as John Wilkes Booth in the TNT movie The Day Lincoln Was Shot (1998), Lifetime's Custody (2007) opposite James Denton, the CBS Hallmark Entertainment mini-series Only Love (1998) opposite Marisa Tomei, the Showtime movie The Thin Blue Lie (2000) opposite Randy Quaid and Paul Sorvino and the CBS movie, Jenifer (2001) opposite Laura San Giacomo, Annabella Sciorra, Jane Kaczmarek, and Marisa Tomei.
As a director, Rob's credits include three episodes of Numb3rs (2005), an episode of HBO's crime drama Oz (1997), three episodes of Showtime's original television series Street Time (2002), and three episodes of CBS' highly lauded drama Joan of Arcadia (2003). Morrow made his directorial debut with The Silent Alarm (1993), which premiered at the 1993 Seattle Film Festival, and went on to screen at the Hamptons, Boston, Edinburgh, and Sundance Film Festivals, with its television debut on Bravo. He also directed Maze (2000), an independent feature, which he wrote, produced and co-starred in with Laura Linney in November 2001.
A native New Yorker, Morrow began his theater career working for Tom O'Horgan and Norman Mailer. On Stage, Morrow starred in the hit Broadway show The Exonerated, a drama based on the true tales of six innocent death-row inmates, opposite Penn Jillette and Mia Farrow. Morrow also appeared in Third Street, at the Circle Repertory Theatre and London's West End production of Birdy. He has also been committed to the theater as a founding member of the nonprofit ensemble Naked Angels, along with Marisa Tomei, Fisher Stevens, Ron Rifkin and Nancy Travis, among others.
Morrow is on the Board of Directors of Project ALS. Co-founded by Jenifer Estess, who was diagnosed with ALS in 1997, Project ALS is committed to funding the research necessary for finding effective treatments and a cure for people living with ALS, a fatal neuromuscular disease.- Cindy Adams was born on 24 April 1930 in New York City, New York, USA. She is an actress, known for Singing in the Dark (1956), The Nanny (1993) and Best Actress (2000). She was previously married to Joey Adams.
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Comedian Darrell Hammond was born in Melbourne, Florida, to Margaret Evelyn (Helms) and Max Carey Hammond. A Saturday Night Live (1975) cast member from 1995 to 2009 - the longest tenure of any SNL cast member - Hammond was one of the sketch TV show's strongest and funniest performers. As well as being part of skits where he had chemistry with other cast members, Hammond won audiences over with dead-on impersonations of various celebrities and Hollywood figures, such as Vice Presidents Dick Cheney and Al Gore, President Bill Clinton, Hardball with Chris Matthews (1997) host Chris Matthews, Sean Connery (who constantly bothered Alex Trebek, played by fellow cast alumni, Will Ferrell, during "Celebrity Jeopardy" skits), Regis Philbin, Donald Trump and many more. Despite his shaky movie resume (The King and I (1999) and New York Minute (2004)), Hammond is still a revelation whenever it comes to SNL.
More recently known for his ongoing 2011 - 2012 SNL Republican Primary coverage and spot-on portrayal of sometimes - candidate Donald Trump.
In May 2011 Darrell published his first auto-biography: God If You're Not Up There I'm F*cked: Tales of Stand-Up, Saturday Night Live, and Other Mind-Altering Mayhem. This book tells how a childhood filled with abuse led to his career as a mimic and impersonator extraordinaire.- Actor
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Born and raised in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, Daniel London began acting and writing plays in high school. As a high school student, he had his award-winning play, "The Martha War", performed at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C. London attended Oberlin College where he continued acting and majored in English and creative writing. He moved to New York City after college graduation to begin his professional career, landing his first major role as Robin Williams's sidekick, Truman Schiff, in Patch Adams (1998). A favorite of Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Beth Henley, London has appeared on stage in two Henley world premiere productions - "Impossible Marriage" (playing opposite Holly Hunter) and, in 2006, "Ridiculous Fraud". London's work in "Impossible Marriage" was seen by Steven Spielberg, who cast him as Wally, the caretaker of the Pre-Cogs, in Minority Report (2002). London has the co-lead role (along with musician Will Oldham) in Kelly Reichardt's award-winning and critically acclaimed film Old Joy (2006). He lives in Brooklyn, New York with his wife, singer/songwriter Megan Reilly.- Producer
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Sandra Annette Bullock was born in Arlington, a Virginia suburb of Washington, D.C. Her mother, Helga Bullock (née Helga Mathilde Meyer), was a German opera singer. Her father, John W. Bullock, was an American voice teacher, who was born in Alabama, of German descent. Sandra grew up on the road with her parents and younger sister, chef Gesine Bullock-Prado, and spent much of her childhood in Nuremberg, Germany. She often performed in the children's chorus of whatever production her mother was in. That singing talent later came in handy for her role as an aspiring country singer in The Thing Called Love (1993). Her family moved back to the Washington area when she was adolescent. She later enrolled in East Carolina University in North Carolina, where she studied acting. Shortly afterward she moved to New York to pursue a career on the stage. This led to acting in television programs and then feature films. She gave memorable performances in Demolition Man (1993) and Wrestling Ernest Hemingway (1993), but did not achieve the stardom that seemed inevitable for her until her work in the smash hit Speed (1994). She now ranks as one of the most popular actresses in Hollywood. For her role in The Blind Side (2009) she won the Oscar, and her blockbusters The Proposal (2009), The Heat (2013) and Gravity (2013) made her a bankable star. With $56,000,000, she was listed in the Guinness Book Of World Records as the highest-paid actress in the world.- Actress
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Carrie Frances Fisher was born on October 21, 1956 in Burbank, California, to singers/actors Eddie Fisher and Debbie Reynolds. She was an actress and writer known for Star Wars: Episode IV - A New Hope (1977), Star Wars: Episode V - The Empire Strikes Back (1980) and Star Wars: Episode VI - Return of the Jedi (1983). Fisher is also known for her book, "Postcards from the Edge", and she wrote the screenplay for the movie based on her novel. Carrie Fisher and talent agent Bryan Lourd have a daughter, Billie Lourd (Billie Catherine Lourd), born on July 17, 1992.- Actress
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Melissa Ellen Gilbert is an American actress, television director, producer, politician, and former president of the Screen Actors Guild. Gilbert began her career as a child actress in the late 1960s, appearing in numerous commercials and guest starring roles on television. From 1974 to 1983, she starred as Laura Ingalls Wilder, the second oldest daughter of Charles Ingalls (played by Michael Landon) on the NBC series Little House on the Prairie. During the run of Little House, Gilbert appeared in several television films, including The Diary of Anne Frank and The Miracle Worker.- Writer
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Prolific, multi-talented comedy writer, story editor, actor and director. His father was an Air Force general (Paul Steinberg Zuckerman) turned stockbroker and his mother was silent screen star Ruth Taylor, formerly a member of Mack Sennett's bathing beauties. Buck Henry's first fling with comedy was as a contributor to the Dartmouth Jack-O-Lantern magazine (known as 'Jacko') while he was still at college. His fellow writers there included such luminaries as Dr. Seuss, novelist Budd Schulberg and the playwright Frank D. Gilroy. Henry attended Harvard Military Academy for a short time before developing an interest in acting which led to a few small roles on Broadway. His budding career was interrupted by military service during the Korean War. In 1961, Henry joined a small improvisational off-Broadway theatre troupe called The Premise for a year before moving to Hollywood. He was to find his greatest popularity in the 60s as one of the principal hosts of Saturday Night Live (1975), writer for The Garry Moore Show (1958) and co-creator/writer (with Mel Brooks) of Get Smart (1965), for which he won an Emmy in 1967. Prior to that, he had already achieved a certain amount of notoriety as co-perpetrator (with Alan Abel) of a hoax which had Henry masquerading as G. Clifford Prout, Jr., president of the bogus Society for Indecency to Naked Animals, making public appearances on network television and other media, demanding that all zoos and wildlife parks be closed until all animals were "properly dressed". At one time he tried to put huge boxer shorts on a baby elephant at San Francisco Zoo. The hoax was eventually exposed after Henry was spotted as an actor by a fellow CBS employee during a Walter Cronkite interview.
One of a new wave of satirists (others including Woody Allen and Alan Arkin) Henry brought an edgier, smarter, more anarchic and at times abrasive style to his writing. Some of his quotable one-liners (in particular for Get Smart) are - and will continue to be - idiomatic. While he was original, clever and invariably funny, not all of Henry's endeavours panned out. Two of his TV parodies proved to be conspicuous failures: Captain Nice (1967) (a send-up of Batman) and Quark (1977) (a Star Trek parody about interstellar garbage collectors). On the plus side, Henry was Oscar-nominated twice: the first time for his screenplay of The Graduate (1967), the second for co-directing (with star Warren Beatty ) the re-make of Heaven Can Wait (1978). Following The Graduate, a New York Times reviewer described him as a cross between Jack Lemmon and Wally Cox , "a terrifying practical joker and a compulsive reader of 200 periodicals a month". He was much in demand as a guest on talk shows (including Johnny Carson, David Letterman and Dick Cavett) and appeared as a self-deprecating actor in most of the films he wrote: as a hotel desk clerk in The Graduate, the cynical Colonel Korn in Catch-22 (1970), a lunatic in Candy (1968), a priest and a TV anchorman in First Family (1980), and so on. In Milos Forman's Taking Off (1971) he also had a rare co-starring role as a father looking for his runaway daughter. Buck Henry passed away at the age of 89 in Los Angeles on January 8 2020.- Director
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Spike Lee was born Shelton Jackson Lee on March 20, 1957, in Atlanta, Georgia. At a very young age, he moved from pre-civil rights Georgia, to Brooklyn, New York. Lee came from artistic, education-grounded background; his father was a jazz musician, and his mother, a schoolteacher. He attended school in Morehouse College in Atlanta and developed his film making skills at Clark Atlanta University. After graduating from Morehouse, Lee attended the Tisch School of Arts graduate film program. He made a controversial short, The Answer (1980), a reworking of D.W. Griffith's The Birth of a Nation (1915), a ten-minute film. Lee went on to produce a 45-minute film Joe's Bed-Stuy Barbershop: We Cut Heads (1983) which won a student Academy Award. In 1986, Spike Lee made the film, She's Gotta Have It (1986), a comedy about sexual relationships. The movie was made for $175,000, and earned $7 million at the box office, which launched his career and allowed him to found his own production company, 40 Acres and a Mule Filmworks. His next movie was School Daze (1988), which was set at a historically black school, focused mostly on the conflict between the school and the Fraternities, of which he was a strong critic, portraying them as materialistic, irresponsible, and uncaring. With his School Daze (1988) profits, Lee went on to make his landmark film, Do the Right Thing (1989), a movie based specifically his own neighborhood in Brooklyn, New York. The movie portrayed the racial tensions that emerge in the Bed-Stuy neighborhood on one very hot day. The movie garnered Oscar nominations for Best Original Screenplay, for Danny Aiello for supporting actor, and sparked a debate on racial relations. Lee went on to produce and direct the jazz biopic Mo' Better Blues (1990), the first of many Spike Lee films to feature Denzel Washington, including the biography of Malcolm X (1992), in which Washington portrayed the civil rights leader. The movie was a success, and garnered an Oscar nomination for Washington. The pair would work together again on He Got Game (1998), an excursion into the collegiate world showing the darker side of college athletic recruiting, as well as the 2006 film Inside Man (2006). Spike Lee's role as a documentarian has expanded over the years, highlighted by his participation in Lumière and Company (1995), the Oscar-nominated 4 Little Girls (1997), to his Peabody Award-winning biographical adaptation of Black Panther leader in A Huey P. Newton Story (2001), through his 2005 Emmy Award-winning examination of post-Katrina New Orleans in When the Levees Broke: A Requiem in Four Acts (2006) and its follow-up five years later If God Is Willing and da Creek Don't Rise (2010). Through his production company 40 Acres and A Mule Filmworks, Lee continues to create and direct both independent films and projects for major studios, as well as working on story development, creating an internship program for aspiring filmmakers, releasing music, and community outreach and support. He is married to Tonya Lewis Lee, and they have two sons, Satchel and Jackson.- Actress
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Penelope Ann Miller is a distinguished artist in film, television, and theater. She has worked with some of the most notable actors and directors in Hollywood. This list includes Al Pacino and Sean Penn in director Brian de Palma's Carlito's Way, for which she received a Golden Globe nomination; Marlon Brando and Matthew Broderick in The Freshman; Robert De Niro and Robin Williams in Penny Marshall's Awakenings; Robert Downey Jr. in Sir Richard Attenborough's Chaplin; Danny DeVito and Gregory Peck in Norman Jewison's Other People's Money; Matthew Broderick and Christopher Walken in Mike Nichols' Biloxi Blues; and Arnold Schwarzenegger in Ivan Reitman's Kindergarten Cop.
On the television side, Ms. Miller stars as 'Joyce Dahmer' in Ryan Murphy's hugely successful miniseries, Dahmer-Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story for Netflix. The true story has been nominated for 13 Emmy Awards and has over a billion hours viewed and counting. Playing the mother of the notorious serial killer, Miller stars opposite, Evan Peters, Richard Jenkins and Niecy Nash. Penelope also starred in American Crime, the critically acclaimed ABC series, from Academy Award winner John Ridley, opposite Regina King. Other credits include the very popular "College Admissions Scandal" for Lifetime, New York Prison Break; The Seduction of Joyce Mitchell for Lifetime, playing "Joyce Mitchell" in another true life story and winning rave reviews. She also starred in HBO's Witch Hunt, directed by Paul Schrader, and starring opposite Dennis Hopper, TNT's Men of a Certain Age opposite Ray Romano, MGM's Rocky Marciano directed by Charles Winkler and opposite Jon Favreau and George C. Scott. Miller also starred once again in another true life story in USA's critically acclaimed Mary Kay Letourneau: All American Girl, playing 'Mary Kay' and directed by Llyod Kramer, opposite Mercedes Ruehl. Ms. Miller starred opposite Oscar winner Jean Dujardin in the black and white silent film The Artist, winner of five Academy Awards including Best Picture. She also took on the role of 'Elizabeth Turner' in the controversial true story of Nat Turner's 1831 slave rebellion The Birth of a Nation starring opposite Colman Domingo and Aunjanue Ellis-Taylor, winning The Grand Jury and Audience awards at the Sundance Film Festival. Some of her other films include Adventures in Babysitting directed by Chris Columbus, Big Top Pee-wee opposite Paul Reubens, The Gun in Betty Lou's Handbag opposite Cathy Moriarty and Julianne Moore, The Shadow opposite Alec Baldwin, The Relic directed by Peter Hyams, and The Messengers opposite Kristen Stewart. Additionally, Penelope wrapped on the upcoming feature film Reagan starring opposite Dennis Quaid as 'Ronald Reagan' and Penelope as 'Nancy Reagan'.
Ms. Miller was also nominated for a Tony Award for her portrayal of 'Emily' in Lincoln Center's Broadway revival of Our Town.- Actor
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Charlie Sheen was born Carlos Irwin Estévez on September 3, 1965, in New York City. His father, actor Martin Sheen (born Ramon Antonio Gerard Estevez), was at the time just breaking into the business, with performances on Broadway. His mother, Janet Sheen (née Templeton), was a former New York art student who had met Charlie's father right after he had moved to Manhattan. Martin and Janet had three other children, Emilio Estevez, Renée Estevez, and Ramon Estevez, all of whom became actors. His father is of half Spanish and half Irish descent, and his mother, whose family is from Kentucky, has English and Scottish ancestry.
At a young age, Charlie took an interest in his father's acting career. When he was nine, he was given a small part in his dad's movie The Execution of Private Slovik (1974). In 1977, he was in the Philippines where his dad suffered a near-fatal heart attack on the set of Apocalypse Now (1979).
While at Santa Monica High School, Charlie had two major interests: acting and baseball. Along with his friends, which included Rob Lowe and Sean Penn, he produced and starred in several amateur Super-8 films. On the Vikings baseball team, he was a star shortstop and pitcher. His lifetime record as a pitcher was 40-15. His interest and skill in baseball would later influence some of his movie roles. Unfortunately, his success on the baseball field did not translate to success in the classroom, as he struggled to keep his grades up. Just a few weeks before his scheduled graduation date, Charlie was expelled due to poor attendance and bad grades.
After high school, Charlie aggressively pursued many acting roles. His first major role was as a high school student in the teen war film Red Dawn (1984). He followed this up with relatively small roles in TV movies and low-profile releases. His big break came in 1986 when he starred in Oliver Stone's Oscar winning epic Platoon (1986). He drew rave reviews for his portrayal of a young soldier who is caught in the center of a moral crisis in Vietnam.
The success of Platoon (1986) prompted Oliver Stone to cast Charlie in his next movie Wall Street (1987) alongside his father and veteran actor Martin Sheen. The movie with its "Greed is Good" theme became an instant hit with viewers.
Shortly after, Stone approached Charlie about the starring role in his next movie, Born on the Fourth of July (1989). When Tom Cruise eventually got the part, Sheen ended up hearing the news from his brother Emilio Estevez and not even getting as much as a call from Stone. This led to a fallout, and the two have not worked together since.
The fallout with Stone, however, did nothing to hurt Charlie's career in the late 1980s and early '90s, as he continued to establish himself as one of the top box office draws with a string of hits that included Young Guns (1988), Major League (1989), and Hot Shots! (1991). However, as the mid-'90s neared, his good fortune both personally and professionally, soon came to an end.
Around this time, Charlie, who had already been to drug rehab, was beginning to develop a reputation as a hard-partying, womanizer. In 1995, the same year he was briefly married to model Donna Peele, he was called to testify at the trial of Hollywood madam Heidi Fleiss. At the trial, while under oath he admitted to spending nearly $50,000 on 27 of Fleiss' $2,500-a-night prostitutes.
His downward spiral continued the following year when his ex-girlfriend Brittany Ashland filed charges claiming that he physically abused her. He was later charged with misdemeanor battery to which he pleaded no contest and was given a year's suspended sentence, two years' probation and a $2,800 fine. He finally hit rock bottom in May 1998 when he was hospitalized in Thousand Oaks, California, following a near-fatal drug overdose. Later that month, he was ordered back to the drug rehab center, which he had previously left after one day.
During this stretch, Charlie's film career began to suffer as well. He starred in a series of box office flops that included The Arrival (1996) and Shadow Conspiracy (1997). However as the 1990s came to end, so did Charlie's string of bad luck.
In 2000, Charlie, now clean and sober, was chosen to replace Michael J. Fox on the ABC hit sitcom Spin City (1996). Though his stint lasted only two seasons, Charlie's performance caught the eye of CBS executives who in 2003 were looking for an established star to help carry their Monday night lineup of sitcoms that included Everybody Loves Raymond (1996). The sitcom Two and a Half Men (2003) starred Charlie as a swinging, irresponsible womanizer whose life changes when his nephew suddenly appears on his doorstep. The show became a huge hit, breathing much needed life into Charlie's fading career.
Charlie's personal life also appeared to be improving. In 2002, he married actress Denise Richards, whom he first met while shooting the movie Good Advice (2001). In March 2004, they had a daughter, Sam, and it was announced shortly after that Denise was pregnant with the couple's second child. By all reports, the couple seemed to be very happy together. However, like all of Charlie's previous relationships, the stability did not last long. In March of 2005, Denise, who was six-months pregnant, filed for divorce, citing irreconcilable differences. She gave birth to a second daughter, Lola, in June of that same year. Their divorce became final in late 2006.- Producer
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Dolly Hall, President, dollface, inc.
Dolly Hall began her producing career in 1990. Dolly's producing credits include such award-winning films as Maria Maggenti's The Incredibly True Adventure of Two Girls in Love, (world premiere Sundance Film festival) Scott Silver's johns (world premiere San Sebastian Film Festival), Alex Sichel's All Over Me (world premiere Sundance Film festival), Tim Blake Nelson's Eye of God (world premiere Sundance Film Festival), Lisa Cholodenko's High Art (world premiere Sundance Film festival), Mark Christopher's 54, Gary Winick's Tadpole (world premiere Sundance Film festival), and Lisa Picard is Famous, directed by Griffin Dunne and produced by Mira Sorvino and Dolly Hall (world premiere Cannes Film Festival). In July 2009, Lion's Gate released "Five Fingers" starring Laurence Fishburne and Ryan Phillipe. Dolly produced Michael Walker's "Price Check", starring Parker Posey and Eric Mabius which world premiered to rave reviews, at the 2012 Sundance Film Festival and was subsequently release by IFC Films in November 2012. Dolly & Michael made another film together, "A Maid's Room", starring Annabella Sciorra and Paula Garces which was release by Paladin Films in August of 2014. Dolly co-produced the NBC doc "Live From New York: The Revolution will be Televised", celebrating the 40th anniversary of Saturday Night Live. The film opened the 2015 Tribeca Film Festival before it's network premiere later the same year. Dolly is currently in development with Lauren Versel on their slate of six TV shows.
We make films and TV that provoke some thought; and that have a strong voice. We support our filmmaker's vision; we seek financing and collaborations to further that vision.- Cinematographer
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