Amy Ryan

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Amy Ryan

Born November 30, 1969 (1969-11-30) (age 38)[1]
Queens, New York

Amy Ryan (born 30 November 1969) is an Academy Award-nominated and Tony Award-nominated American actress.

Contents

[edit] Career

[edit] Stage

Prior to attending New York's High School of Performing Arts, Ryan attended Stagedoor Manor Performing Arts Center in upstate New York. Hired for the National Tour of Biloxi Blues right out of high school, Ryan worked steadily Off-Broadway for the next decade. She also worked in regional theater, where she originated roles in new plays by Neil LaBute, Arthur Miller and Neil Simon.

Her Broadway debut came in 1993, as Tess in The Sisters Rosensweig, and she replaced Calista Flockhart as Natasha in a 1997 revival of The Three Sisters. In 2000, Ryan received the first of two Best Supporting Actress Tony Award nominations for playing the love-starved Sonya in Uncle Vanya by Anton Chekhov. An appearance as Peggy in the 2001 Broadway revival of The Women followed, and she was again nominated for a Tony for playing Stella Kowalski in A Streetcar Named Desire in 2005.

[edit] Television

Following a brief stint playing a runaway on As the World Turns, Ryan was cast in television series such as I'll Fly Away, in which she played a high school temptress, and Brooklyn Bridge, where she played Marion Ross in flashbacks. After roles on ER and Chicago Hope, Ryan became a series regular on The Naked Truth as Tea Leoni's spoiled stepdaughter.

By 2001, director Sidney Lumet cast her in 100 Centre Street playing three different roles (Ellen, Paris and Rebecca). Ryan went on to feature prominently in the second season of HBO's The Wire, playing Port Authority Officer Beadie Russell, and also appeared in several episodes of NBC's Law & Order. She appeared on the Season 4 finale of The Office and is widely expected to take a regular role as a replacement for Paul Lieberstein's Toby Flenderson.[2]

[edit] Film

After her 1999 movie debut in Roberta, Ryan appeared in You Can Count on Me and Keane. Albert Brooks chose her to play his wife in Looking for Comedy in the Muslim World in 2005, and 2007 brought both Dan in Real Life and Before the Devil Knows You're Dead. Her role as a star-struck sheriff's wife in Capote earned her positive reviews, but it was playing a hardened Welfare mom in Ben Affleck's Gone Baby Gone that finally brought her national attention.

After being voted Best Supporting Actress for Gone Baby Gone by the National Board of Review as well as the critics circles in New York, Los Angeles, Boston, San Francisco and Washington, DC, Ryan's performance was also nominated for a Golden Globe Award, a Screen Actors Guild Award[3] and an Oscar for Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role at the 80th Academy Awards[4]

Ryan's upcoming film Changeling, directed by Clint Eastwood, will premiere in the fall of 2008, and she is also appearing opposite Matt Damon in Paul Greengrass's next project, Green Zone.

[edit] Filmography

Films scheduled for release in 2008 or later include The Missing Person (2008), Bob Funk (2008), Changeling (2008), and Green Zone (2009).

[edit] Awards and nominations

In 2007, for her work in Gone Baby Gone, Ryan won a Satellite Award for Best Supporting Actress - Motion Picture from the International Press Academy, the National Board of Review Award for Best Supporting Actress and "Best Supporting Actress" awards from the Alliance of Women Film Journalists, the Broadcast Film Critics Association, the Online Film Critics Society, and numerous regional critics associations, including the Boston Society of Film Critics, the Florida Film Critics Circle, the Houston Film Critics Society, the Los Angeles Film Critics Association, the New York Film Critics Circle, the Oklahoma Film Critics Circle, the Phoenix Film Critics Society, the St. Louis Gateway Film Critics Association, the San Diego Film Critics Society, the San Francisco Film Critics Circle, the Southeastern Film Critics Association, the Utah Film Critics Association, and the Washington D.C. Area Film Critics Association.

The 2007 L.A. Film critics and the 2007 Washington D.C. area critics awards were also in recognization of her work in Before the Devil Knows You're Dead.

Her Gone Baby Gone performance also led to award nominations from the 80th Academy Awards, the 65th Golden Globe Awards, the 14th Screen Actors Guild Awards, the National Society of Film Critics, and regional critics associations such as the Chicago Film Critics Association, the Dallas-Fort Worth Film Critics Association, the Detroit Film Critics Society, and the Toronto Film Critics Association.

[edit] References

  1. ^ Amy Ryan Biography from CelebrityGossip.com
  2. ^ NBC Springs into Sweeps. Retrieved on 2008-04-24.
  3. ^ Amy Ryan, Screen Actors Guild Award nominee
  4. ^ Amy Ryan, Oscar nominee for Best Supporting Actress

[edit] External links