Sissy Spacek

Born: 25 December 1949
Where: Quitman, Texas, USA

The actress won a best actress Oscar for Michael Apted's musical drama The Coal Miner's Daughter.

She has also been nominated seven times - as best actress for Carrie, Missing, The River, Crimes of the Heart and In The Bedroom.

Skipping college, Spacek (dubbed "Sissy" by her two older brothers) left Texas and headed to New York where she stayed with her cousin, actor Rip Torn, intent on making it as a singer.

She had a small break when, under the pseudonym Rainbo, she recorded the song "John, You've Gone Too Far This Time".

Switching to acting, she landed work as an extra in Andy Warhol's Trash and a bigger role as a teenager abducted by a white slavery ring in Prime Cut.

However, it was opposite Martin Sheen in Badlands as two disturbed teenagers who go on a killing spree that raised her profile.

She went on to play John-Boy's love interest in The Waltons but again switching styles terrified as the anti-heroine of Brian De Palma's adaptation of Stephen King's novel Carrie.

She received a Best Actress Oscar nomination for her performance.

It was Spacek's performance as country singer Loretta Lynn in the biographical drama Coal Miner's Daughter that really brought her success and a Best Actress Academy Award.

Spacek agreed to star in her husband Jack Fisher's 1981 directorial debut, Raggedy Man, and followed this with Missing, for which she earned another Oscar nomination as Best Actress.

Two years later, she received her fourth Best Actress Academy Award nomination starring opposite Mel Gibson in The River.

Spacek landed roles in the 1986 film versions of two Pulitzer-winning plays.

The first was 'Night Mother with Anne Bancroft, after which she earned another Best Actress Academy Award nomination for Crimes of the Heart.

She took time off from acting to concentrate on starting a family, but resumed her career in 1990, with the civil rights drama The Long Walk Home and as Kevin Costner's wife in JFK.

Spacek appeared in several TV roles before reappearing in features playing Nick Nolte's girlfriend in Affliction, and appearing in the dark comedy Blast From the Past.

In 2001, Sissy landed one of the best roles of her career, an Oscar-nominated turn in In the Bedroom alongside Tom Wilkinson.

Recent work includes a spliff-smoking mom in the drama A Home at the End of the World with Colin Farrell.