Illeana Douglas | |
|---|---|
 Douglas in 2009 | |
| Born | Illeana Hesselberg (1961-07-25)July 25, 1961 (age 64) New Haven, Connecticut, U.S. |
| Education | Neighborhood Playhouse AADA |
| Occupations |
|
| Years active | 1987–present |
| Spouse | |
| Partner(s) | Martin Scorsese (1989–1997) |
| Relatives | Melvyn Douglas (grandfather) |
| Website | illeanadouglas |
Illeana Hesselberg (/ˌɪliˈɑːnə/IL-ee-AH-nə; born July 25, 1961), known professionally asIlleana Douglas, is an American actress and filmmaker. Following her screen debut with a small part inHello Again (1987), she went on to appear in a variety of mainstream andindependent features throughout the 1990s, such asGoodfellas (1990),Cape Fear (1991),Alive (1993),To Die For (1995),Grace of My Heart (1996),Chasing Amy,Picture Perfect (both 1997),Happy, Texas;Message in a Bottle; andStir of Echoes (all 1999). Her other credits includeThe Next Best Thing (2000),Ghost World (2001),Dummy (2002),Factory Girl (2006),She's Funny That Way (2014), andReturn to Sender (2015).
Outside film, Douglas won theSatellite Award for Best Actress for her starring role as Wendy Ward on the short-lived sitcomAction (1999). She appeared as Angela on the first season ofSix Feet Under (2001), receiving a nomination for thePrimetime Emmy for Outstanding Guest Actress, and played the recurring role of Gina Bernardo onLaw & Order: SVU (2002–2003). Her other work includesEasy to Assemble (2008–2012), aweb series she created, wrote, and starred in. Douglas appears regularly onTurner Classic Movies, hosting specials focused on female filmmakers throughout history.[1][2]
Douglas was born on July 25, 1961 inNew Haven, Connecticut, the daughter of Joan Douglas (née Georgescu), a schoolteacher, and Gregory Hesselberg (1926–2017),[3] a painter.[4][5][6][7][8] Douglas's father was the son of Hollywood actorMelvyn Douglas and his wife, the artist Rosalind Hightower.[9] Douglas had two older brothers, Stefan Gregor Hesselberg (1958–2007),[10][11] a technician in thehistology laboratory at theMassachusetts Institute of Technology who also trained racehorses inVerona, Italy, and Erik Hesselberg, a journalist.[7] Douglas along with her siblings areMayflower descendants through their father's side.[12][13]
Douglas grew up primarily inOld Saybrook, Connecticut, and has said that she was also raised in many other cities, in Massachusetts where her father lived, Connecticut where her mother lived, and New York, where her extended family lived. During her childhood she spent time going back and forth between relatives during the summer.[14] Douglas said that her parents were heavily influenced by the 1970shippie culture—her father especially by the movieEasy Rider. They had a loose parenting style and did not pressure her to go to college. Comedy albums were popular in her family. They would put on dramatic interpretations and performances.[15]
Douglas's mother's side isRoman Catholic[15]—Italian and Romanian[16] fromAstoria, Queens. Her maternal grandmother worked in the restaurant atGertz department store in Astoria; her maternal grandfather was a welder.[14] Douglas said that her maternal grandmother, a formerRockette, had wanted to be an actor. She instilled in Douglas a love for the movies, which they attended together frequently when she was a child.[15]
As a child she would visit her paternal grandfather, the actor Melvyn Douglas, in his apartment in Manhattan on theUpper West Side as well as at his home in theHollywood Hills section of Los Angeles.[9][14] Douglas said that during her summers with her grandfather, he introduced her to his interests, which included theater,elocution, reading, art, and history.[15]
Douglas has said that her grandfather's performance inBeing There was influential on her own career.[9][17] In the 1940s, Douglas' grandfather andPeter Sellers both served in the military during WWII and met in Burma. In the 1960s, the two men reconnected in London and talked about their time together in the war.[17] During high school, Douglas visited the set while they were shooting on location inAsheville, North Carolina and met Sellers, whose work she admired greatly. It was the first time she was on a film set.[15] She graduated from Haddam-Killingworth High School inHigganum, Connecticut in 1979.[18]
Douglas notes the contrast between her working-class Italian roots and the glamorous Hollywood world of her paternal side of the family. Famous people includingMyrna Loy,Gore Vidal,Gloria Steinem, politicians, writers, and others were often present, in asalon-like environment. Douglas has said it took her a long time to reconcile the different lifestyles she was exposed to in her youth. She identifies more with the Italian side of her family, and has said that she developed more of their "rhythms and ways" due to the amount of time she spent with them in Queens.[14]
After graduating from high school, Douglas moved to New York City.[14] Having been interested in movies from her childhood, Douglas wanted to be in show business.[15] She stayed with relatives in various temporary arrangements. Douglas attendedAmerican Academy of Dramatic Arts, where she was a contemporary ofElias Koteas andLou Mustillo. Following their first year, Mustillo and Douglas were not invited back to the school.[14]
When she was 18 years old, Douglas went to work forSteve Rubell at the Morgans Hotel. While there, Douglas decided to reinvent herself, and began attendingNeighborhood Playhouse School of the Theatre, where she studied with the acting teacher Richard Pinter.[14] While she was working in a sketch comedy group called Manhattan Punchline, one of the troupe members suggested she try stand-up comedy.[15] Douglas worked briefly at Stand Up New York, and found the writing and acting easy, but found the performing difficult. She did not like the raw comedy style then in vogue, and did not enjoy the lifestyle of a standup comic.[14][15]
Douglas began working for a well-known publicist,Peggy Siegal. Through this position, she tried to send herheadshot toMartin Scorsese's casting director, but was not successful. At that time, Scorsese was editing his filmLast Temptation of Christ in an office down the hall from Siegal's offices. The editors needed a sound effect to conveyMary Magdalene screaming, and asked her to help out. In this way, Douglas met Scorsese, his editor,Thelma Schoonmaker, as well as filmmakerMichael Powell, and provided manyADR of crowd sounds. The group bonded over discussion of old films, which was a long-standing interest. Scorsese and Douglas eventually began a long-term relationship.[19]
Soon afterwards, she got her first movie role: a small part in Scorsese's segment ofNew York Stories.[20] Douglas said thatLorraine Bracco took Douglas under her wing during the shooting of Scorsese'sGoodfellas, helping her to find an agent. It was then that Douglas became Scorsese's girlfriend.[19]
Douglas appeared in Scorsese'sCape Fear (1991) – one of four Scorsese films in which she has appeared. AfterCape Fear, she had several film roles where her character was eventually cut, including inHousehold Saints,Jungle Fever, andQuiz Show. "It was kind of depressing," she commented.[19]
Douglas acted in a low-budget movie calledGrief that was accepted intoSundance, which led to her meeting directorAllison Anders.[19]
Douglas had a supporting role in 1995'sTo Die For, a film that boosted her career in which the directorGus Van Sant taught her about the technical aspects of filmmaking, such as camera blocking, film lenses, and modulating a performance for film.[19] It was also a movie where she felt that theMeisner technique she learned at theNeighborhood Playhouse started to connect for her.[14]
Douglas and Allison Anders wanted to collaborate on a film, and began work on a biography ofAnne Sexton, which never came to fruition. As they were both interested in music, Douglas suggested a movie about the personalities of theBrill Building, where she had worked. This led to her first starring role as singer-songwriter Denise Waverly in Anders' 1996 film,Grace of My Heart.[21][19]
She had another supporting role inGhost World (2001).[22]
In 2016, Douglas appeared oppositeSean Astin in the independent feature film,Unleashed.[23]
On television, Douglas appeared in a memorable role as one ofGarry Shandling's love interests towards the end of the series,The Larry Sanders Show, in 1998.[24] In 1999, she had a starring role oppositeJay Mohr in the seriesAction. She played a television executive who started out as a prostitute who had Mohr as a regular customer.[25]
She guest starred onSeinfeld,Frasier andThe Drew Carey Show, and has played a public defender on several episodes ofLaw & Order: Special Victims Unit in 2002 and 2003. She appeared in two episodes of theHBO TV seriesSix Feet Under, both of which earnedEmmy nominations for Guest Actress in a Drama. She appeared as Mrs. Ari's sister Marci in the Season 7 finale ofEntourage.
In 2006, she starred in theLifetime TV filmNot Like Everyone Else and played herself inPittsburgh oppositeJeff Goldblum. In 2007, Douglas was added to the cast ofUgly Betty, playing Sheila, an editor forMODE magazine.[26]
Douglas spent time in Sweden shooting a TV show calledWelcome to Sweden, which was produced byAmy Poehler and also starredGreg Poehler andLena Olin. The series was a Swedish-American co-production that aired on Swedish TV as well as onNBC.[14]
Douglas has written and directed a comedy shortThe Perfect Woman (1993) (a satire about what men really want from women), the documentaryEverybody Just Stay Calm—Stories in Independent Filmmaking (1994), and the satireBoy Crazy, Girl Crazier (1995). She has been the producer for several projects includingIlleanarama, a collection of her short films for theSundance Channel.
From 2008 to 2012, Douglas starred in a web series sponsored byIKEA calledEasy to Assemble, where she plays herself as an actor-in-recovery-from-acting who goes to work at IKEA.[27] Douglas said that she had a great deal of autonomy from sponsor IKEA, whose only condition was that the show be suitable for children and families.[28] It was canceled after 4 seasons.[29][30]
In 2015, Douglas produced and developed a series forJoey Soloway calledThe Skinny.[29]
Douglas worked on aTurner Classic Movies series calledFriday Night Spotlight, a prime-time show featuring a month-long festival of movies programmed by special guests. The season that she worked on focused on the theme "Second Looks".[31] Douglas said that curating, writing, and working on this series allowed her to use her movie knowledge while making it funny, entertaining, and informative.[14]
In 2015, in association with the advocacy group,Women in Film, Douglas presented a month-long series on the TCM cable channel called "Trailblazing Women," an initiative to highlight women's contributions to the art of cinema. Douglas became involved in the project when she found out that theAmerican Film Institute's list of 100 greatest American movies didn't includeany movies directed by women.[32] The series was also in response to active discussions about thegender imbalance in Hollywood. The series will present work by female pioneers likeDorothy Arzner,Alice Guy-Blaché,Agnès Varda,Lina Wertmüller, as well as interviews withAllison Anders,Amy Heckerling,Julie Dash, and others.[33] The series will be a multi-year event, with the first year's focus on women directors from the 1920s to the present. Each night is themed, with programming topics from foreign films to African-American filmmakers.[34]
In 2015 Douglas published a memoir calledI Blame Dennis Hopper which was released throughFlatiron Books. In the memoir, Douglas tells about her life via her love for the movies and her exposure to Hollywood through her paternal grandfatherMelvyn Douglas.[34] Not long after the book's release, she began a podcast with the same title.[39]
From 1989 until 1997, Douglas was in a relationship with directorMartin Scorsese.[40]
On May 16, 1998, she married producer and writer Jonathan Axelrod, the stepson of producerGeorge Axelrod; they divorced in 2001.[40][41][42] Douglas said that the period after her divorce was difficult both emotionally and financially, and that she relocated from living in Los Angeles to the New York area, where she took classes at her former school, theNeighborhood Playhouse, and worked in theater. She also began writing and directing.[14]
Douglas is a vegetarian.[36] She was named afterPrincess Ileana of Romania.[22]
Blu-rayDVDbookOCLC 1077206039OCLC 1100589636OCLC 1206364129
| Year | Title | Role | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1987 | Hello Again | Mother in park | |
| 1988 | The Last Temptation of Christ | Crowd member | |
| 1989 | New York Stories | Paulette's friend | |
| 1990 | Goodfellas | Rosie | |
| 1991 | Guilty by Suspicion | Nan | |
| Cape Fear | Lori Davis | ||
| 1993 | Alive | Liliana Methol | |
| Household Saints | Evelyn Santangelo | ||
| Grief | Leslie | ||
| 1994 | Quiz Show | Woman at book party | |
| 1995 | Search and Destroy | Marie Davenport | |
| Judgement | Laurel | Short | |
| To Die For | Janice Maretto | Nominated—Saturn Award for Best Supporting Actress | |
| 1996 | Wedding Bell Blues | Jasmine | |
| Grace of My Heart | Denise Waverly | ||
| 1997 | Picture Perfect | Darcy O'Neil | |
| Hacks | Georgia Feckler | ||
| 1998 | The Thin Pink Line | Julia Bullock | |
| 1999 | Flypaper | Laura | |
| Stir of Echoes | Lisa Weil | ||
| Happy, Texas | Doreen Schaefer | ||
| Message in a Bottle | Lina Paul | Nominated—Blockbuster Entertainment Award for Favorite Supporting Actress – Drama | |
| Rock 'n' Roller Coaster | Band manager | Short | |
| 2000 | The Next Best Thing | Elizabeth Ryder | |
| 2001 | Ghost World | Roberta Allsworth | |
| 2002 | Dummy | Heidi Schoichet | |
| The New Guy | Kiki Pierce | ||
| The Adventures of Pluto Nash | Dr. Mona Zimmer | ||
| 2003 | The Kiss | Joyce Rothman | |
| Missing Brendan | Julie Conroy | ||
| 2005 | Alchemy | KJ | |
| The Californians | Olive Ransom | ||
| 2006 | Factory Girl | Diana Vreeland | |
| The Bondage | Elaine Edwards | ||
| 2007 | Walk the Talk | Jill | |
| Order Up | Waitress | Short | |
| Osso Bucco | Megan | ||
| Expired | Wilman | ||
| 2008 | The Year of Getting to Know Us | Christine Jacobson | |
| Otis | Kate Lawson | ||
| 2009 | April Showers | Sally Reedman | |
| Life Is Hot in Cracktown | Mommy | ||
| 2010 | Spärhusen Plays The Egyptian | Beirget Kattson | Short |
| 2011 | The Green | Trish | |
| Knots | Miriam | ||
| 2013 | Monarch | Lindsey Teller | Short |
| Chez Upshaw | Rita Upshaw | ||
| Dark Around the Stars | Dayton | ||
| Max Rose | Jenny Flowers | ||
| A Country Christmas | Susan Satcher | ||
| It's Dark Here | Linda Tennies | ||
| 2014 | The Boxcar Children | Mary Moore (voice) | |
| Sister | Aunt Connie | ||
| Outlook Not So Good | Mom | Short | |
| She's Funny That Way | Judy | ||
| 2015 | All Stars | Billie | |
| Road Hard | Kim Madsen | ||
| Pearly Gates | Karen Weiner | ||
| Mega Shark Versus Kolossus | Dr. Alison Gray | ||
| Return to Sender | Judy | ||
| 2016 | The Late Bloomer | Linda | |
| Unleashed | Monty | ||
| 2024 | In Fidelity | Ethel |
| Year | Title | Role | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1995 | Homicide: Life on the Street | Gina Doolen | Episode: "Autofocus" |
| 1995 | The Single Guy | Martha | Episode: "Sister" |
| 1997 | Weapons of Mass Distraction | Rita Pasco | Television movie |
| 1997 | Rough Riders | Edith Roosevelt | Television movie |
| 1997 | Bella Mafia | Teresa Scorpio Luciano | Television movie |
| 1998 | Seinfeld | Loretta | Episode: "The Strongbox" |
| 1998 | The Larry Sanders Show | Herself | 2 episodes |
| 1999 | Brother's Keeper | Ginny | Episode: "Dating the Teacher" |
| 1999 | Lansky | Anna Lansky | Television movie |
| 1999–2000 | Action | Wendy Ward | 13 episodes Satellite Award for Best Actress – Television Series Musical or Comedy |
| 2001 | Frasier | Mrs. Daly | Episode: "Hungry Heart" |
| 2001 | The Drew Carey Show | Rachel Murray | 2 episodes |
| 2001–2005 | Six Feet Under | Angela | 3 episodes Nominated—Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Guest Actress in a Drama Series |
| 2002 | Point of Origin | Kate | Television movie |
| 2002–2003 | Law & Order: Special Victims Unit | Gina Bernardo | 3 episodes |
| 2006 | Crumbs | Shelley | 3 episodes |
| 2006 | Not Like Everyone Else | Toni Blackbear | Television movie |
| 2006–2007 | Shark | Gloria Dent | 2 episodes |
| 2007 | Ugly Betty | Sheila | 3 episodes |
| 2008 | Law & Order: Criminal Intent | Beverly Tyson | Episode: "Contract" |
| 2010–2011 | Entourage | Marcie | 2 episodes |
| 2011 | The Cape | Netta Stilton | 2 episodes |
| 2011 | Chaos | Linda Phillips | Episode: "Two Percent" |
| 2013 | Maron | Herself | Episode: "Dominatrix" |
| 2013 | Drop Dead Diva | Dr. Reza | Episode: "The Kiss" |
| 2013 | CSI: Crime Scene Investigation | Ruby Banks | Episode: "Passed Pawns" |
| 2013 | Grey's Anatomy | Dr. Alma | Episode: "Man on the Moon" |
| 2014–2015 | Welcome to Sweden | Nancy | 6 episodes |
| 2015 | Chasing Life | Mariann Russo | 2 episodes |
| 2016 | Modern Family | Janet | Episode: "Double Click" |
| 2019 | The Simpsons | New Age Clerk (voice) | Episode: "Crystal Blue-Haired Persuasion" |
| 2019 | Goliath | Rita | 7 episodes |
| 2019 | All Rise | Beatrix Rycroft | Episode: "Dripsy" |
| 2020–2021 | Shrill | Sheila | 3 episodes |
| 2022 | Search Party | Annabelle | Episode: "The Gospel of Judas" |
| Year | Title | Role | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2008–2012 | Easy to Assemble | Illeana | 48 episodes |
| 2010–2011 | The Temp Life | Eve Randall | 5 episodes |
| 2010 | The Webventures of Justin and Alden | Herself | Episode: "1760" |
| 2010 | Suite 7 | Livvy | Episode: "Soulmates" |
| 2016 | The Skinny | Jacqueline | 5 episodes |
