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Rachel Weisz extracted from Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia, distributed under the GNU Free Documentation License

Rachel Weisz
photographed in 2007
Born	Rachel Hannah Weisz 7 March 1970 (1970-03-07) (age 40) London, England, UK
Years active	1993–present
Domestic partner(s)	Darren Aronofsky (2002-present)

Rachel Hannah Weisz (pronounced /ˈvaɪs/ "vyess"; born 7 March 1970)¹ is an English actress and model.² She gained wide public recognition after her portrayal of Evelyn "Evy" Carnahan-O'Connell in the films The Mummy and The Mummy Returns. In 2001, she starred opposite Hugh Grant in the hit About a Boy and continued to garner leading roles in Hollywood productions. Her performance in The Constant Gardener (2005) won her the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress, along with other major motion picture awards.

Contents 1 Early life and background 2 Career 2.1 Screen 2.2 Stage 2.3 Other 3 Personal life 4 Filmography 5 Awards and honours 6 References 7 External links

Early life and background

Weisz was born in Westminster, London, England, and grew up in Hampstead Garden Suburb.³ Her mother, Edith Ruth (née Teich), is a teacher turned psychotherapist who was born in Vienna, Austria.⁴ Her father, George Weisz, is a Hungarian-born inventor and engineer. Weisz's parents fled to England during World War II. Her father is Jewish and her mother has been referred to as either Catholic⁵ or Jewish (as well as "half-Italian").⁶⁷ Weisz was raised in a "cerebral Jewish household"⁸ and refers to herself as Jewish.⁹¹⁰ Weisz has a sister, Minnie Weisz, who is an artist.

Weisz was educated privately at prestigious independent schools for girls: North London Collegiate School, Benenden School, and St Paul's Girls' School. She then entered Trinity Hall, Cambridge, where she graduated with a 2:1 in English. During her university years she appeared in various student productions, co-founding a student drama group called Cambridge Talking Tongues, which went on to win a Guardian Student Drama Award at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival for an improvised piece called Slight Possession.

Career

Screen

Having already worked for television productions, with parts in such major UK television series as Inspector Morse (1993), Weisz started her cinema career in 1995 with Chain Reaction and then appeared in Bernardo Bertolucci's Stealing Beauty. She followed this work with more English films including My Summer with Des, Swept from the Sea, The Land Girls, and Michael Winterbottom's I Want You. Although she received favourable critical recognition for her work to this point, her breakout into wide audience recognition came from a popular serio-comic horror movie The Mummy, in which she played the lead female role alongside Brendan Fraser. She followed this up with two hits, The Mummy Returns (2001), which grossed higher than the original, and About a Boy (2002) with Hugh Grant. Since then, her other film work has included Enemy at the Gates (2001), Runaway Jury (2003) and Constantine (2005).

In 2005, Weisz starred in Fernando Meirelles's The Constant Gardener, a film adaptation of a John le Carré thriller of the same title set in the slums of Kibera and Loiyangalani, Kenya. For this performance, Weisz won the 2006 Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress,¹¹ the 2006 Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actress and the 2006 Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Supporting Role. In her home country, she was recognised as a leading role for the film according to the nomination from the BAFTA awards and winnings from the London Critics Circle Film Awards and British Independent Film Awards.

The same year, she starred in The Fountain and also provided the voice for Saphira in the fantasy film Eragon. Her subsequent films include the Wong Kar-wai-directed drama My Blueberry Nights (in which she played an "anti-Southern belle")¹¹ and director Rian Johnson's The Brothers Bloom, in which she plays a wealthy American woman targeted by two con man brothers (Adrien Brody, Mark Ruffalo).¹¹ She plays the lead role of Hypatia of Alexandria in the historical drama film Agora, released in October 2009.

Stage

Her breakthrough role was that of Gilda in Welsh director Sean Mathias's 1995 West End revival of Noel Coward's 1933 play Design for Living at the Gielgud Theatre. Her other stage work includes the role of Catherine in a London production of Tennessee Williams' Suddenly Last Summer and Evelyn in Neil LaBute's The Shape of Things at the Almeida Theatre (also film) at its, then, temporary location in London's Kings Cross. In 2009 she played Blanche DuBois in a Donmar revival of A Streetcar Named Desire.¹², Critics' Circle Theatre Award Best Actress 2009.

Other

On 7 July 2007, Weisz presented at the American leg of Live Earth. She is represented by Independent Models in London.

Personal life

Weisz is engaged to American filmmaker and producer Darren Aronofsky. They have been dating since 2002. They have a son, Henry Chance, born on 31 May 2006 in New York City.¹³¹⁴ The couple reside in the East Village in Manhattan. Weisz also serves as a muse to fashion designer Narciso Rodriguez.¹⁵

Filmography

Year	Film	Role	Notes
1995	Death Machine	Junior Executive
1996	Chain Reaction	Dr. Lily Sinclair
	Stealing Beauty	Miranda Fox
1997	Bent	Prostitute
	Going All the Way	Marty Pilcher
1997	Swept from the Sea	Amy Foster
	I Want You	Helen
1998	The Land Girls	Ag (Agapanthus)
1999	The Mummy	Evelyn "Evy" Carnahan	Nominated — Saturn Award for Best Actress Nominated — Empire Award for Best British Actress
	Sunshine	Greta	Nominated — Genie Award for Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role
	Tube Tales	Angela
2000	Beautiful Creatures	Petula
	This Is Not an Exit: The Fictional World of Bret Easton Ellis	Lauren Hynde
2001	Enemy at the Gates	Tania Chernova	Nominated — European Film Award for Best Actress
	The Mummy Returns	Evelyn Carnahan O'Connell/Princess Nefertiri
2002	About a Boy	Rachel
2003	Confidence	Lily
	The Shape of Things	Evelyn Ann Thompson
	Runaway Jury	Marlee
2004	Envy	Debbie Dingman
2005	Constantine	Angela Dodson/Isabel Dodson	Nominated — Teen Choice: Movie Scream Scene
	The Constant Gardener	Tessa Quayle	Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actress - Motion Picture Screen Actors Guild Award for Best Supporting Actress - Motion Picture London Film Critics Circle Award for British Actress of the Year British Independent Film Award San Diego Film Critics Society Award for Best Supporting Actress Nominated — BAFTA Award for Best Actress in a Leading Role Nominated — Chicago Film Critics Association Award for Best Supporting Actress Nominated — Broadcast Film Critics Association Award for Best Supporting Actress Nominated — Online Film Critics Society Award for Best Supporting Actress
2006	The Fountain	Izzi/Isabella I of Castile
	Eragon	Saphira (voice)
2007	Fred Claus	Wanda
	My Blueberry Nights	Sue Lynn
2008	Definitely, Maybe	Summer Hartley (Natasha)
2009	The Brothers Bloom	Penelope
	The Lovely Bones	Abigail Salmon
	Agora	Hypatia	completed
2010	The Whistleblower	Kathryn Bolkovac	filming
	Dirt Music	Georgie Jutland	pre-production
	Unbound Captives		pre-production

Awards and honours

Weisz gained numerous honours for her work in The Constant Gardener, which included: Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress, Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actress - Motion Picture, Screen Actors Guild Award for Best Supporting Actress - Motion Picture. She was also nominated for the BAFTA Award for Best Actress in a Leading Role. Furthermore, the critical acclaim she received for her performance also garnered her the London Critics Circle Film Award for British Actress of the Year, the British Independent Film Award for Best Actress and the San Diego Film Critics Society Award for Best Supporting Actress. Additionally, she was nominated for the Online Film Critics Society Award for Best Supporting Actress.

In 2006, Weisz was invited to join the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.¹⁶ Weisz also received the BAFTA LA British Artist of the Year award in 2006.

In January 2010 at the Critics' Circle Theatre Awards in London she was named Best Actress 2009 for her performance as Blanche Dubois in the Donmar revival of A Streetcar Named Desire.

References

Wikinews has related news: 2006 Oscars handed out at Kodak Theatre Rachel Weisz wants botox ban for actors

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Rachel Weisz

• Rachel Weisz at the Internet Movie Database
• Rachel Weisz at Yahoo! Movies
• Rachel Weisz at TV.com

Awards for Rachel Weisz v • d • e Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress Jennifer Connelly (2001) · Catherine Zeta-Jones (2002) · Renée Zellweger (2003) · Cate Blanchett (2004) · Rachel Weisz (2005) · Jennifer Hudson (2006) · Tilda Swinton (2007) · Penélope Cruz (2008) · Mo'Nique (2009) Complete list · (1928–1940) · (1941–1960) · (1961–1980) · (1981–2000) · (2001-present) v • d • e Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actress – Motion Picture Jennifer Connelly (2001) · Meryl Streep (2002) · Renée Zellweger (2003) · Natalie Portman (2004) · Rachel Weisz (2005) · Jennifer Hudson (2006) · Cate Blanchett (2007) · Kate Winslet (2008) · Mo'Nique (2009) Complete List · (1943–1960) · (1961–1980) · (1981–2000) · (2001–present) v • d • e Screen Actors Guild Award - Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Supporting Role Helen Mirren (2001) · Catherine Zeta-Jones (2002) · Renée Zellweger (2003) · Cate Blanchett (2004) · Rachel Weisz (2005) · Jennifer Hudson (2006) · Ruby Dee (2007) · Kate Winslet (2008) · Mo'Nique (2009) Complete list · (1994-2000) · (2001-present)

Persondata
NAME	Weisz, Rachel
ALTERNATIVE NAMES	Campbell, Kenya
SHORT DESCRIPTION	English actress
DATE OF BIRTH	1970-03-07
PLACE OF BIRTH	London, England
DATE OF DEATH
PLACE OF DEATH