Sarah Jessica Parker

Sarah Jessica Parker (born March 25, 1965) is an internationally recognized Golden Globe and Emmy-winning American actress, with a portfolio of television, movie, and theatre performances. She may be best known for her role as newspaper relationship columnist Carrie Bradshaw on the HBO television series Sex and the City.

Biography

Early life and career

Parker was born in Nelsonville, Ohio to Stephen Parker, a Jewish American businessman, and Barbara, who may also have Jewish ancestry. Her parents divorced early on in Parker's life and her mother remarried Paul Forste, a truck driver. Parker grew up with her mother, stepfather and seven siblings. As a young girl, she trained in singing and ballet, soon being cast in the Broadway production of The Innocents. Her family moved to Cincinnati, Ohio, and then to Dobbs Ferry, New York, near New York City, where Parker was developing her career as a child actress. In 1977, the family moved to the newly opened planned community on Roosevelt Island, in the East River between Manhattan and Queens, and later to Manhattan proper; her parents later moved to Englewood, New Jersey where she attended Dwight Morrow High School.

Parker attended the American Ballet School and the Professional Children's School, and later Dwight Morrow High School. She and four siblings appeared in a revival of The Sound of Music, and Parker went on to the new 1977-81 Broadway musical Annie — first in the small role of "July," and then succeeding Andrea McArdle and Shelley Bruce in the lead role as the plucky Depression-era orphan, for a year beginning March 6, 1979.

In 1982, Parker was cast in the co-lead role of the CBS-TV sitcom Square Pegs. The show lasted only one season before being cancelled by the network, but Parker's performance was critically well received. In the two years that followed, she was cast in four films - the most significant of those being Footloose in 1984. Also that year, she become romantically involved with actor Robert Downey Jr., whom she met on the set of Firstborn and with whom she lived through 1991; during their relationship, Downey, Jr. had a drug problem, and Parker has commented that she thought that she was "the person holding him together".

Adult career

By the early 1990s, Parker's career was gaining momentum. In 1991, she appeared in a supporting role in the romantic comedy, L.A. Story; both the movie and her performance garnered some positive reviews. The following year she landed an important starring role in the well-received film, Honeymoon in Vegas, co-starring Nicolas Cage. Her 1993 starring role in the film Hocus Pocus was a higher grosser at the box office but received negative reviews. She next appeared opposite Johnny Depp in the critically acclaimed movie Ed Wood. The film Miami Rhapsody, in 1995, saw her back on familiar territory with more romantic comedy material and a leading role. She appeared in another Tim Burton-directed movie, Mars Attacks!, which was one of her five film roles in 1996.

After a quiet 1997, the script for an HBO drama/comedy series titled Sex and the City had been sent to Parker and the show's creator Darren Star was determined that she be cast in his project. Despite some early doubts about being cast in a long-term television series, Parker agreed to star.

circulated and it has since been revealed that a script had been completed for such a project. However, Parker has commented that it will likely never be made. In addition to work in movie and television, she is also a respected stage actor, having appeared in well-reviewed lead roles in the off-Broadway play Sylvia, alongside husband Matthew Broderick in How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying, and the Tony Award-nominated Once Upon A Mattress, as Princess Winifred the Woebegone.

In December 2005, Parker appeared in her first theatrical film in several years, The Family Stone; she received a Golden Globe nomination as Best Actress - Comedy for the role. Her next film, the romantic comedy Failure to Launch, co-starring Matthew McConaughey, was released on March 10, 2006 and opened at #1 in the North American box office, grossing slightly over $24 million, despite mediocre reviews.. Parker's work as a Producer continues, with the independent film Spinning Into Butter, based on the Rebecca Gilman play scheduled for a 2006 release which she will also star in. Her latest confirmed project is Slammer, a prison-themed musical comedy to be directed by Adam Shankman and released in 2007. The role as imprisoned publicist who stages an all-inmate musical will give Parker the opportunity to revisit her musical roots which have yet to be explored in her film and television work.

Personal style

Parker has become very influential in the world of fashion; she is considered one of the more stylish celebrities and has been recognized as "Best Dressed" in certain magazines. She has become a fashion designer's dream, as one of the world's most stylish and adored women. In 2000, she hosted the MTV Movie Awards and appeared in no less than 15 different costumes throughout the show.

She has also become the face of many of the world's biggest fashion brands through her work in a variety of advertising campaigns. In August 2003, Parker signed a highly lucrative deal with Nutrisse Hair Products to appear in television and print advertising. In 2004, she fronted an international campaign by GAP but her contract with the clothing giant was suddenly terminated in Spring of 2005 in favour of british soul singer Joss Stone. A friend of Parker commented to the press that "Sarah's spring campaign for Gap has only just started and she feels the announcement of her replacement in the same week that the new ads are appearing is a bit of a snub".. In addition to her advertising work, Parker released her own fragrance in 2005 called Lovely.

Personal life

As her career continued to blossom into the 1990s, she met journalist John Kennedy Jr. and dated him for several months. She was also romantically linked to singer/songwriter Joshua Kadison in the early 90's, who described their tumultuous relationship and their cat 'Moses' in the song "Jessie"; from the album "Painted Desert Serenade". In May 1997, she married actor Matthew Broderick, to whom she was introduced by her brother. The couple were married in a civil ceremony in a historic synagogue that is no longer used as a house of worship; both Parker and Broderick consider themselves "culturally Jewish". Parker and Broderick's first child, James Wilke Broderick, was born on October 28, 2002. They spend a considerable amount of time at their holiday home in County Donegal, Ireland. Parker is a prominent member of the Hollywood's Women's Political Committee and is UNICEF's Representative for the Performing Arts; in the course of 2006, she will travel to Liberia as a Unicef celebrity ambassador, and has commented that "It's a place that gets little or no attention, so we're going to try and bring some attention to it." As of 2006, she lives in New York City with her husband and son James Wilke Broderick who is now 3 years old.

Awards

2000: Golden Globe - Best Actress in a Comedy or Musical Series - Sex and the City
2001: Golden Globe - Best Actress in a Comedy or Musical Series - Sex and the City
2002: Golden Globe - Best Actress in a Comedy or Musical Series - Sex and the City
2004: Golden Globe - Best Actress in a Comedy or Musical Series - Sex and the City
2004: Emmy - Best Lead Actress in a Comedy Series - Sex and the City

Selected filmography

Year	Title	Role	Other notes
2008	American Dog		voice
2007	Vacancy
2006	Failure to Launch	Paula
2005	The Family Stone	Meredith Morton
2001	Life Without Dick	Colleen Gibson	direct-to-video
2000	State and Main	Claire Wellesley
1999	Dudley Do-Right	Nell Fenwick
1997	'Til There Was You	Francesca Lanfield
1996	Mars Attacks!	Nathalie Lake
1996	If Lucy Fell	Lucy Ackerman
1996	The First Wives Club	Shelly Stewart
1995	Miami Rhapsody	Gwyn Marcus
1994	Ed Wood	Dolores Fuller
1993	Striking Distance	Jo Christman/Det. Emily Harper
1993	Hocus Pocus	Sarah Sanderson
1992	Honeymoon in Vegas	Betsy/Donna
1991	L.A. Story	SanDeE
1986	Flight of the Navigator	Carolyn
1985	Girls Just Want to Have Fun	Janey Glenn
1984	Footloose	Rusty

References

Footnotes

Interviews

New York Newsday interview, March 8, 2006
BBC interview (December, 2005)
FemaleFirst.uk interview (December 13, 2005)
Dark Horizons interview (December 8, 2005)

Web Sites

Sarah Jessica Parker two photo galleries of Sarah.
Biography at Inside the Actors Studio
Biography at Playbill
Biography at Sex and the City's website
Sarah Jessica Parker Page
Sarah Jessica Parker Online
Sarah Jessica Parker Gallery
Top results on AmIAnnoying.com. SJP is currently in 17th place.

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