Janet McTeer Biography
Born: May 8, 1961
Although British audiences had been familiar with her work since the mid-'80s, it wasn't until Janet McTeer's Oscar-nominated performance in 1999's Tumbleweeds that American filmgoers also began to take notice. A Newcastle native whose versatile physical features compliment her ability to truly realize a character (no matter how foreign), McTeer made her film debut opposite screen siren Sigourney_Weaver in the 1986 feature Half_Moon_Street. Though her looks and talent for intense personal drama made comparisons to veteran star Vanessa_Redgrave common, McTeer soon distinguished herself on the London stage with roles in +The Grace of Mary Traverse and +Greenland, small-screen parts in Precious_Bane (1989) and Portrait of a Marriage (1990) proved that her talent transferred outside the theater, as well. Critics also singled out her performance in the 1992 adaptation of Wuthering_Heights. That same year, McTeer stepped into the shoes of super-sleuthing professor Loretta Lawson in the made-for-TV mystery A Masculine Ending, and she reprised the role in the following year's Don't Leave Me This Way. It was her turn as a determined prison warden in the popular U.K. series The Governor, however, that found McTeer truly coming into her own on television. Her imposing (six foot-one inch) frame and emotional vulnerability worked in perfect harmony to create a compelling character, and McTeer began to become a familiar face to PBS viewers in the U.S. thanks to roles in such efforts as Precious_Bane (1989) and The_Black_Velvet_Gown (1991).
After winning both Olivier and Tony awards in 1997 for her performance in the stage version of +A Doll's House, McTeer began to work almost exclusively in films. Just a year after she made a vocal impression on stateside audiences as the narrator of Todd_Haynes' glam rock-tribute Velvet_Goldmine in 1998, American audiences were offered a face to accompany the voice (though thanks to her masterful Southern accent, they may not have recognized it) with the release of the mother/daughter road drama Tumbleweeds. Cast as a nomadic, free-spirited mother, McTeer's Oscar-nominated performance left quite an impression, even if the film itself ultimately didn't. The actress followed this film with three titles in 2000: Waking the Dead, Songcatcher, and The_King_Is_Alive. She then took a two-year break from the screen before returning with 2002's The_Intended, which she also co-wrote.
McTeer continued to work steadily on the stage, on TV, and in movies, but her next big awards splash came in 2011 when her supporting work in the gender-bending drama Albert Nobbs garnered her nominations from the Academy, the Golden Globes, and the Screen Actors Guild. Jason Buchanan, Rovi
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