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Sigourney Weaver
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
 |
This article may require cleanup to meet Wikipedia's quality standards. Please improve this article if you can. (November 2007) |
| Sigourney Weaver | |
|---|---|
 Sigourney Weaver in 1989 |
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| Birth name | Susan Alexandra Weaver |
| Born | October 8, 1949 Manhattan, New York City |
| Spouse(s) | Jim Simpson (1984-) |
Sigourney Weaver (born Susan Alexandra Weaver on October 8, 1949 in New York City) is an Academy Award-nominated American actress most known for the "Alien" film series.
Contents |
Weaver is the daughter of late NBC television executive Pat Weaver (d. 2002) and Elizabeth Inglis, a former British actress (d. 2007). Her uncle, Doodles Weaver, was a comedian and actor.
She began using the name Sigourney Weaver in 1963, aged 14, after a character in F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby.[1] [2]
She attended the Ethel Walker School, a prep school in Simsbury, Connecticut and graduated from Stanford University. She studied law at Yale Law School, then drama, where she appeared in original plays by friend and classmate Christopher Durang. She later appeared in the 1981 off-Broadway production of his comedy Beyond Therapy.
Although Weaver has played a number of critically acclaimed roles in movies like Gorillas in the Mist, The Ice Storm, Dave, and The Year of Living Dangerously, she is best known for her appearances as Warrant Officer/Lieutenant Ellen Ripley in the blockbuster "Alien" movie franchise. Her first appearance as Ripley was in Ridley Scott's 1979 film Alien. She reprised the role in three sequels, Aliens, Alien³, and Alien: Resurrection. She was nominated for a Best Actress Academy Award for portraying Ripley in Aliens. Ripley was a breakthrough role: the first female action hero. Although Ripley is tender and nurturing with a cat or a child, she is tough and aggressive with adult humans and alien monsters, and ruthless enough to blow up her own ship or a planetary colony; in the third film, she destroys herself to prevent the xenomorph species from spreading.
Weaver also appeared in Ghostbusters and Ghostbusters II as Dana Barrett. She played the role of the agoraphobic criminal psychologist Helen Hudson in the 1995 movie Copycat, and went on to become the most highly paid actress of the 1990s. In addition to her trademark role as Ripley, Weaver has recently concentrated on smaller, more challenging roles such as 1999's A Map of the World and 2006's Snowcake. Critics have also noted her consistent performances in comedic roles, such as in Jeffrey (1994), Galaxy Quest (1999), and Heartbreakers (2001), in which she starred with Jennifer Love Hewitt.
In 1997, Weaver won the BAFTA Award for her supporting role in Ang Lee's The Ice Storm.
In 2003, Weaver was voted 20th in Channel 4's countdown of the 100 greatest movie stars of all time. She was one of only two women in the top 20 (the other was Audrey Hepburn). That year, she also played The Warden in the movie Holes.
In 2006, Weaver returned to Rwanda for the BBC special Gorillas Revisited.
Bryan Singer originally wanted Weaver to play the lead villainess role of Emma Frost in X-Men: The Last Stand. But after Singer left the project to direct Superman Returns, the story changed considerably and the part of Emma Frost was dropped entirely from the script.[citation needed]
In addition to her Academy Award nomination for Aliens, Weaver has received two other nominations in her career, both in 1988. This makes Weaver one of only ten actors and actresses to have received two nominations in the same year. Weaver received a Best Actress nomination for her role as gorilla conservationist Dian Fossey in Gorillas in the Mist and a Best Supporting Actress nomination for her role as Katharine Parker in Working Girl opposite Harrison Ford and Melanie Griffith. She did not win either nomination, but was awarded a Golden Globe for each role. By failing to win an Oscar in either category for 1988, she became the first person in history to lose twice in the same ceremony. Only two people have been "double losers" since then - Emma Thompson in 1994 and Julianne Moore in 2003.
Weaver married theater director Jim Simpson (The Flea Theater) in 1984. They have one child, Charlotte Simpson (born 13 April 1990).
After making Gorillas in the Mist, she became a supporter of The Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund and is now the DFGFI's honorary chairperson.[3]
Weaver is an environmentalist. [4] In October 2006 she drew international attention through a news conference at the start of a United Nations General Assembly policy deliberation. She outlined the widespread threat to ocean habitats posed by deep-sea trawling, an industrial method for harvesting fish. She also narrated the BBC/Discovery Channel show Planet Earth, which focuses on the wonders of our world.[5] [6]
Weaver is notable for her stature, standing 6' (1.83 m) tall. She is also notable for her wardrobe and at one point in the 1990s was picked by two separate magazines as best dressed and worst dressed.[citation needed]
The Italian lesbian science-fiction comics character Legs Weaver is inspired by Sigourney Weaver's role in Alien.
In the South Park episode Quest for Ratings a dead horse is mistaken to be Sigourney Weaver.
In 2007 Weaver reprised her role of Ellen Ripley in a commercial for DirecTV. In the commercial Weaver in the power loader vehicle from the movie Aliens is battling the queen xenomorph while explaining to watchers how DirecTV is a better deal than cable.
| Year | Film | Role | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1977 | Annie Hall | Alvy's Date Outside Theater | |
| 1979 | Alien | Ellen Ripley | |
| 1981 | Eyewitness | Tony Sokolow | |
| 1982 | The Year of Living Dangerously | Jilly Bryant | |
| 1984 | Ghostbusters | Dana Barrett | |
| 1985 | Une femme ou deux | Jessica Fitzgerald | |
| 1986 | Half Moon Street | Dr. Lauren Slaughter | |
| Aliens | Ellen Ripley | ||
| 1988 | Gorillas in the Mist: The Story of Dian Fossey | Dian Fossey | |
| Working Girl | Katharine Parker | ||
| 1989 | Ghostbusters II | Dana Barrett | |
| 1992 | Alien³ | Ellen Ripley | Co-Producer |
| 1492: Conquest of Paradise | Queen Isabella | ||
| 1993 | Dave | Ellen Mitchell | |
| 1995 | Copycat | Helen Hudson | |
| Jeffrey | Debra Moorhouse | ||
| 1994 | Death and the Maiden | Paulina Escobar | |
| 1997 | The Ice Storm | Janey Carver | |
| Snow White: A Tale of Terror | Claudia Hoffman | ||
| Alien: Resurrection | Ellen Ripley clone | Co-Producer | |
| 1999 | A Map of the World | Alice Goodwin | |
| Galaxy Quest | Gwen DeMarco/Lieutenant Tawny Madison | ||
| 2001 | Heartbreakers | Max Conners/Angela | |
| 2002 | Tadpole | Eve Grubman | |
| 2003 | Holes | Warden Walker | |
| 2004 | Imaginary Heroes | Sandy Travis | |
| The Village | Alice Hunt | ||
| 2006 | |||
| Snow Cake | Linda Freeman | ||
| The TV Set | Lenny | ||
| Infamous | Babe Paley | ||
| 2007 | |||
| Happily N'Ever After | Frieda | Voice only | |
| Planet Earth | Narrator | Narration only (Discovery Channel Version) | |
| The Girl In The Park | Julia Sandburg | Completed; premiere at the Toronto Festival 2007 | |
| 2008 | |||
| Gypsy and Me | Gypsy Rose Lee | TV; In production; executive producer | |
| Vantage Point | Rex | Completed | |
| Baby Mama | Chaffee Bicknell | Filming | |
| The Tale of Despereaux | The narrator | In production; voice only | |
| 2009 | Avatar | Grace | Filming |
| Awards | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by Sally Kirkland for Anna |
Golden Globe Award for Best Actress - Motion Picture Drama 1989 for Gorillas in the Mist |
Succeeded by Michelle Pfeiffer for The Fabulous Baker Boys |
| Preceded by Olympia Dukakis for Moonstruck |
Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actress - Motion Picture 1989 for Working Girl |
Succeeded by Julia Roberts for Steel Magnolias |
| Preceded by Juliette Binoche for The English Patient |
BAFTA Award for Best Actress in a Supporting Role 1997 for The Ice Storm |
Succeeded by Judi Dench for Shakespeare in Love |
- ^ http://akas.imdb.com/name/nm0000244/bio
- ^ http://akas.imdb.com/name/nm0000244
- ^ http://www.gorillafund.org/dian_fossey/
- ^ http://chge.med.harvard.edu/events/#NYC_Dinner
- ^ http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/N03201755.htm
- ^ http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=38361&newsdate=04-Oct-2006
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