Uma Thurman
Born: 29 April 1970
Where: Boston, USA
The statuesque six foot former model and Quentin Tarantino favourite got her real breakthrough as the femme fatale mobster wife in Pulp Fiction.
Donning a black wig and making a dark shade of Chanel nail varnish so popular it sold out for months, she stole the show from under the nose of John Travolta.
Annd it was Tarantino who catapulted back up the Hollywood ladder when he cast her as The Bride in the kung fu homage Kill Bill.
She was born to a professor of Indo-Tibetan Buddhist Studies, Robert - the first westerner to become a Tibetan Buddhist monk - and Swedish psychotherapist Nena.
Named after the goddess of light and beauty in Indian Mythology, her brothers - Ganden, Dechen and Mipam - also boast bizarre monikers.
Thurman made her film debut in Kiss Daddy Goodnight, before going on to receive critical acclaim a year on with Dangerous Liaisons.
Her first leading role came with Henry & June, based on Anais Nin's diaries and she acquitted herself well as Kim Basinger's disturbed sister in Final Analysis, a blind woman in Jennifer 8, a gangster's moll in Mad Dog And Glory.
After her Oscar-nominated turn in Pulp Fiction, she appeared opposite Vanessa Redgrave in the period romance A Month By The Lake.
On dodgier ground she vamped it up for Batman And Robin and The Avengers, but both were forgettable box office failures.
Previously married to British actor and director Gary Oldman - she was just 20 when they tied the knot - she met Ethan Hawke on the set of Gattaca and married him in 1998.
They had a daughter, Maya, and son, Roan, together before separating in 2003.
In the Spring of 1999, she made her stage debut in the updated version of Moliere's The Misanthrope in New York.
Subsequent big screen roles have included Woody Allen's Sweet and Lowdown opposite Sean Penn and Samantha Morton and Vatel alongside Gerard Depardieu.
Thurman returned to costume drama with the Merchant-Ivory adaptation of The Golden Bowl opposite Nick Nolte.
After the indie hit Tape, for which she was nominated for an Independent Spirit Award, the call came again from Tarantino.
Kill Bill saw her effortlessly taking centre stage as the vengeful bride consumed with hatred for the former fellow assassins who had betrayed her.
In 2004, she starred in John Woo's so-so sci-fi thriller Paycheck opposite Ben Affleck.
Recent work includes the sequel to hit comedy-thriller Get Shorty - Be Cool - opposite Pulp Fiction co-star John Travolta, but her latest performance is in the movie musical The Producers, written and composed by Mel Brooks in which she plays Swedish blond bombshell Ulla.
