Frances McDormand
Born: 23rd June 1957
Where: Illinois, USA
The off-kilter actress will forever be associated with her Oscar-winning performance as pregnant cop Marge Gunderson in the Coen Brothers' Fargo.
In addition, she was also nominated for a best supporting actress award for Mississipi Burning and Almost Famous.
After graduating from Yale Drama School, she hit the New York stage, appearing in several plays, notably Painting Churches and Sing!
Her big screen debut came in 1984 as a woman whose husband hires a hit man to kill her and her lover in Blood Simple, the debut film of the Coen brothers.
McDormand was still virtually an unknown when she won a 1988 Oscar nomination playing a Southern woman abused by her Klansman husband in Alan Parker's Mississippi Burning.
The same year, she won the admiration of Ken Loach for her turn as an American human rights activist in Hidden Agenda, his political thriller set against the battleground of Northern Ireland.
The British director told her "Not only have you changed my opinion of actors, you've changed my opinion of Americans."
McDormand admits that she took roles in the Hollywood comedies The Butcher's Wife and Passed Away "to prove that I could be funny."
She also admitted that she took the part as Patricia Arquette's sister in Beyond Rangoon so that she could travel to Malaysia.
She her earned a Best Actress Academy Award for Fargo, her third film with husband Joel and brother-in-law Ethan.
She was next seen in Cameron Crowe's Almost Famous in the same year, playing the overprotective mother of the young journalist (Patrick Fugit) drawn from Crowe's experiences as a teenager writing for Rolling Stone.
Reteaming with the Coen brothers, she filmed the excellent The Man Who Wasn't There alongside Billy Bob Thornton.
Next she stole the show as a doped up LA record producer in the character-driven drama Laurel Canyon and starred opposite Robert De Niro in City By The Sea.
Upcoming projects include the romantic comedy Something's Got To Give with Jack Nicholson.
