Karen Black

Born: 1st July 1939
Where: Illinois, USA

Brilliant as a waitress, a hooker or a women generally on the edge of sanity, Black has played some impressive characters in her lengthy career.

She started off on the stage, taking on roles in small shows until she hit Broadway in 1965, winning critical acclaim for her performance in The Playroom.

Then Hollywood beckoned and she made her first big break in Francis Ford Coppola's You're A Big Boy Now (1966), but she really made her name in Easy Rider (1969) starring alongside Dennis Hopper, Peter Fonda and a young Jack Nicholson.

In 1970 she was nominated for an Oscar and a Golden Globe for her performance in Five Easy Pieces in which she appeared with Nicholson again.

Throughout the 70s she appeared in a mass of films, some good, such as the Great Gatsby (1974) and Hitchcock's last movie Family Plot (1976) and some not so memorable.

The 80s and 90s weren't so illustrious for Black but her role as Mother Firefly in Rob Zombie's schlock horror House of 1000 Corpses (2003) sees her back at her best. She plays a twisted old nympho not averse to a spot of murder.