Mira Sorvino
- Actress
- Producer
- Soundtrack
Mira Katherine Sorvino was born on September 28, 1967 in Manhattan. She
is the daughter of
Lorraine Davis, an actress turned
drama therapist, and veteran character actor
Paul Sorvino. Her father's family were
Italian immigrants. The young Sorvino was intelligent, an avid reader
and an exceptional scholar. Her father discouraged her from becoming an
actor, as he knew how the industry often chews up young stars. She
attended Harvard, majoring in Chinese, graduating magna cum laude in
1989, largely on the strength of her thesis, a Hoopes Prize-winning
thesis on racial conflict in China, written and researched during the
year spent in Beijing, which helped her fluency in Mandarin Chinese.
However, she showed interest in a career in acting from an early age,
and moved to New York City to try her hand in the City's film industry,
waitressing, auditioning and working at the Tribeca production company
of Robert De Niro. She succeeded in
getting a little television work in the early 1990s, but got her first
film job in the independent gangster movie
Amongst Friends (1993), on which
she worked her way up the ladder behind the camera to eventually
associate-produce the film, and, more importantly, was eventually cast
as the female lead. The indie production was well-received, and
Sorvino's performance attracted enough buzz to get her cast in two more
movies, one a more prominent indie,
Barcelona (1994), the other her first
Hollywood feature, Quiz Show (1994),
and her skillful performances brought her yet more attention.
An exceptionally poised and articulate young woman, she may have seemed
inappropriate to play a crazy hooker, but
Woody Allen took the chance, and her
magnificent performance as the female lead in his
Mighty Aphrodite (1995) proved
her range as a performer and earned her an Oscar (at the tender age of
29) for Best Supporting Actress. Since winning the Oscar, Sorvino has
continued to take a wide range of roles, including another stretch as
Marilyn Monroe in
Norma Jean & Marilyn (1996),
co-starring with another very intelligent and skilled young actress,
Ashley Judd. Forays into action and horror,
such as Mimic (1997) and
The Replacement Killers (1998)
show that Sorvino is not above being playful in the film roles she
chooses.
However, what forever cemented her role in popular culture was her
performance as charmingly silly California beach girl Romy White in
Romy and Michele's High School Reunion (1997),
in which she and co-star Lisa Kudrow utter
one hilarious absurdity after another.
Mira Sorvino married
Christopher Backus on June 11, 2004,
and the couple have four children.
is the daughter of
Lorraine Davis, an actress turned
drama therapist, and veteran character actor
Paul Sorvino. Her father's family were
Italian immigrants. The young Sorvino was intelligent, an avid reader
and an exceptional scholar. Her father discouraged her from becoming an
actor, as he knew how the industry often chews up young stars. She
attended Harvard, majoring in Chinese, graduating magna cum laude in
1989, largely on the strength of her thesis, a Hoopes Prize-winning
thesis on racial conflict in China, written and researched during the
year spent in Beijing, which helped her fluency in Mandarin Chinese.
However, she showed interest in a career in acting from an early age,
and moved to New York City to try her hand in the City's film industry,
waitressing, auditioning and working at the Tribeca production company
of Robert De Niro. She succeeded in
getting a little television work in the early 1990s, but got her first
film job in the independent gangster movie
Amongst Friends (1993), on which
she worked her way up the ladder behind the camera to eventually
associate-produce the film, and, more importantly, was eventually cast
as the female lead. The indie production was well-received, and
Sorvino's performance attracted enough buzz to get her cast in two more
movies, one a more prominent indie,
Barcelona (1994), the other her first
Hollywood feature, Quiz Show (1994),
and her skillful performances brought her yet more attention.
An exceptionally poised and articulate young woman, she may have seemed
inappropriate to play a crazy hooker, but
Woody Allen took the chance, and her
magnificent performance as the female lead in his
Mighty Aphrodite (1995) proved
her range as a performer and earned her an Oscar (at the tender age of
29) for Best Supporting Actress. Since winning the Oscar, Sorvino has
continued to take a wide range of roles, including another stretch as
Marilyn Monroe in
Norma Jean & Marilyn (1996),
co-starring with another very intelligent and skilled young actress,
Ashley Judd. Forays into action and horror,
such as Mimic (1997) and
The Replacement Killers (1998)
show that Sorvino is not above being playful in the film roles she
chooses.
However, what forever cemented her role in popular culture was her
performance as charmingly silly California beach girl Romy White in
Romy and Michele's High School Reunion (1997),
in which she and co-star Lisa Kudrow utter
one hilarious absurdity after another.
Mira Sorvino married
Christopher Backus on June 11, 2004,
and the couple have four children.