Dianne Wiest

Born: March 28 1948
Where: Kansas City, Missouri

The onetime wannabe ballerina is best known for her long association with director and writer Woody Allen with appearances in five of his movies.

The eldest child and only daughter of a pilot and a nurse, Wiest was an "Army brat" who grew up in several communities in the USA and Germany.

While a teenager, she studied at the School of American Ballet, which she abandoned at 16 in favour of the stage.

Dropping out of college, where she studied acting, Wiest began her career touring with the American Shakespeare company.

She had an early role in 1984 as John Lithgow's long-suffering wife in Footloose but is perhaps best known for her performances in five Woody Allen films: The Purple Rose Of Cairo, September, Radio Days, Hannah And Her Sisters and Bullets Over Broadway.

Wiest picked up her first Academy Award in 1986 for her scene-stealing turn as Mia Farrow's younger sister in Hannah And Her Sisters. But after that win, Hollywood only seemed interested in casting her in maternal roles.

From The Lost Boys in 1987 to Edward Scissorhands in 1990, she seemed to serve the same function but still managed a second Oscar nomination in 1989 for her role as a divorcee in Ron Howard's Parenthood.

Wiest's next triumph came in 1994 after another successful collaboration with Woody Allen.

Her portrayal of the flamboyant, tempestuous ageing actress Helen Sinclair in Bullets Over Broadway earned her a second Oscar and a Golden Globe for Best Supporting Actress.

She is also credited with making her boozy delivery of the phrase "Don't Speak" the most memorable in any of Allen's films.

Subsequent appearances include The Birdcage and The Horse Whisperer and she appeared alongside Nicole Kidman and Sandra Bullock in Practical Magic.

Roles followed in the American TV series Law & Order and The 10th Kingdom before she landed the role of an opera diva in the lame farce Merci Dr Rey.