Inspiring Careers In Modern Cinema: Mary McCormack

I am starting a new series that will basically focus on modern American actors whom I think are great but for whatever reason typically aren't getting the kind of parts their talents deserve. These actors, I guess, can be considered just slightly under the radar and this series will be my little way of paying tribute to them.

New Jersey native Mary McCormack was born in February of 1969, in her early teens she began appearing in school stage productions and after studying at New York's William Esper Studio she made her New York stage debut in her early twenties. She has since gone on to appear in several Broadway and off-Broadway productions including most recently a revival of CABARET.

The IMDB lists her first screen credit as a small role in a 1994 episode of LAW AND ORDER. After that she would quickly make the leap to the big screen with a small but noticeable role in the well meaning MIRACLE ON 34TH STREET remake. She would then appear in a couple of straight to video offerings before landing the part of Howard Stern's wife in PRIVATE PARTS. This was the first time I saw Mary and she stood out to me immediately as someone who radiated a real warmth and intelligence in her acting style. PRIVATE PARTS remains one of her most well known roles and she is indeed extremely memorable in the film and helps give it an emotional center that wouldn't have been there otherwise.
Several more straight to video features as well as some tv work followed Betty Thomas' PRIVATE PARTS before Mary would appear in a another female director's film, this time the Mimi Leder helmed 1998 film DEEP IMPACT. Mary would again prove unforgettable in a small role that would find her outshining most of the bigger names in the cast.
1999 would prove to be a very big year for Mary with three very good roles in higher profile films. First up was Clint Eastwood's underrated TRUE CRIME. Mary has just one scene in this film but it is a great one and it just happens to be shared with Eastwood himself. Watching Mary work with someone of Eastwood's stature is fascinating as she not only holds her own with the great man but actually seems to bring something special out in him. Mary's second film of 1999, MYSTERY ALASKA, offered a much larger role and the opportunity to work with two great icons, Burt Reynolds and Russell Crowe. I like this little film a lot and Mary plays off wonderfully well with both of the awesomely talented leading men. She would close out the year with a leading role in the very entertaining and well receive comedy, THE BIG TEASE.
Mary would appear in a whopping ten films in the next two years, including the delightful HIGH HEELS AND LOW LIFES opposite her friend Minnie Driver, before landing one of her best roles in Steven Soderbergh's flawed but interesting FULL FRONTAL.
FULL FRONTAL is perhaps a perfect encapsulation of Mary's career so far. Here she is in a film surrounded by big name Hollywood stars, such as Julia Roberts, and yet she is still the warmest, most captivating and real person in it. Comparing her to the mannered, and pretty dull, Roberts in this film is fascinating when you stop to think how huge Roberts is and how most people will even barely know the name Mary McCormack. I'm not trying to wage an attack on Julia Roberts, I am just trying to point out that there is an ease and naturalness to McCormack that most major 'stars' in modern cinema do not posses. Mary is the best part of FULL FRONTAL and I think it is still one of the great performances of this now not so young decade.

Soderbergh would recognize how incredible talented Mary was and would cast her in one of the leading roles in his short lived but ambitiously alive tv series, the searing K STREET. As the greedy and selfish Maggie Morris, McCormack created one of the great characters in television from this decade. The show would come under a lot of criticism but I find it, and specifically Mary McCormack's work, to be among the most memorable of the last few years.
After K STREET'S quick cancellation, Mary would find her greatest role yet in the intense and extremely undervalued miniseries TRAFFIC. I thought this version of TRAFFIC was the equal to the British original and actually topped Soderbergh's Oscar winning film. Mary's work as the morally fragmenting Carole is the work of a real master and I thought the Emmy and Golden Globe snub was shameful. TRAFFIC is one of the great modern mini series and Mary McCormack's work in it is truly revelatory, and of the quality rare seen in television productions.
TRAFFIC should have opened the door wide for Mary McCormack but things have been on the quiet side since. Some solid tv work in E.R. and THE WEST WING followed the great mini series but for the most part Mary has concentrated on her family, which probably shows that the warmth and compassion she generates in many of her roles strongly reflects who the real Mary McCormack is.
Mary can currently be seen in 1408, which is a surprisingly strong thriller. Like most of her other projects, her part is small but she still manages to steal every scene she is in. It is a continuing reminder of how incredibly talented this woman is, even though it is a talent that continues to be overlooked by many.
Mary McCormack is one of my favorite actresses in modern American cinema. I would also argue that she is one of the best and if she hasn't yet had a role that really captured the American public's eye, give her time. I think a lot of great things are in store for this wonderful and winning young woman.

I'm not the only one who recoginizes how great Mary is. Here are links to two very good fan sites.

http://vtibika.free.fr/

http://www.geocities.com/matching8/

Inspiring Careers in Modern Cinema: Chloe Sevigny

Born in Darien, Connecticut in the late fall of 1974 to a strict Catholic family, Chloe Stevens Sevigny probably seemed like an unlikely candidate to blossom into one of the most uncompromising and bravest actors in modern American cinema. Since her searing screen debut in Larry Clark’s Kids (1995) though she has been just that, an intense and potent reminder that the independent heart of American cinema always has a strong backbone behind it.
Springing from both Polish and French heritage, Sevigny was the youngest of two children in a relatively normal household. Her rather sheltered world began to open up as a teenager when she began to make regular visits to New York City in the late eighties and early nineties. Blossoming into a remarkably striking and beautiful young woman, Sevigny was discovered just past her 18th birthday by a Fashion magazine editor who brought her on as an intern.


After landing her intern position, Sevigny’s world quickly changed and within a year she was modeling on the front of a Gigolo Aunts album, hanging out with Sonic Youth's Kim Gordon and having odes written to her in the press by Jay Mcinerney. Cinema seemed the natural extension for the exciting young scenester and it came calling in 1995 when Sevigny came into the view of controversial photographer and filmmaker Larry Clark, who was planning a new film based on a screenplay by a young writer named Harmony Korine.


It’s a bit hard to describe the impact Kids had on the film world in 1995, but it was a searing one and much of it was due to the devastating performance Chloe Sevigny delivered as Jennie for Clark and Korine. Simultaneously projecting an inexperience with a world weariness and an intensity not possessed in very many actors from her generation, Sevigny’s work in Kids marked her as one of the most important newcomers of the nineties and destroyed doubters who thought Mcinerney’s “It-Girl” would be a quick flash in the pan.

Sevigny followed up Kids with the remarkable Trees Lounge (1996), a knowing and controlled film directed by and starring Steve Buscemi. Again delivering a haunting performance in a smaller role, Sevigny’s work and the film itself continues to be one of the small hidden treasures of American Independent Cinema in the nineties.


Next up for the young actress was Gummo (1997), the directorial debut film from Korine and the film which briefly marked the end of her first run with strictly independent films, as her next work would be relatively high profile affair.
1998’s Palmetto (1998) from director Volker Schlondorff would indeed be Sevigny’s first mainstream work and it would see her working alongside Woody Harrelson and Elisabeth Shue. The cast is particularly good in Palmetto but the modern noir finally suffers from a rather tired script.

After the disappointing Palmetto, Chloe appeared in Whit Stillman’s interesting The Last Days of Disco(1998) opposite a strong Kate Beckinsale. Despite not finding the success of Stillman’s previous works Metropolitan (1990) and Barcelona (1994), The Last Days of Disco has arguably aged better and is need of a reassessment.


Sevigny would strike gold with her next film, a low budget affair called Boys Don’t Cry (1999) that would become one of the major films of 1999 and would garner her an Academy Award Nomination as Best Supporting Actress. Viewed today, Boys Don’t Cry is quite a haunting work and the pairing of Sevigny and Hilary Swank was an inspired choice by director Kimberly Peirce. It is worth noting that Chloe was originally up for the lead in the film but she opted for the supporting spot, a career line she has bravely followed throughout her career.


After filming Boys Don’t Cry, Sevigny was offered the lead female role in Buffalo 66 (1998), the debut feature film from writer-director-actor Vincent Gallo. Scheduling conflicts didn’t permit it and the plum role went to Christina Ricci, although Gallo and Sevigny’s paths would cross again several years later.

Boys Don’ Cry proved to be a hard film to follow for the recently Oscar nominated Sevigny. She became more and more of a fashion icon and had strong roles in Korine’s Julian Donkey Boy (1999) and Mary Harron’s audacious American Psycho (1999) but she seemed out of place in A Map of the World (1999). Some TV work followed as well as a spot in the Anthology film Ten Minutes Older (2002) before she would return to form in Olivier Assayas’ flawed but still powerful DemonLover (2002) and the ferocious Party Monster (2002) for directors Fenton Bailey and Randy Barbato.


2003 would prove to be the most controversial year in Chloe Sevigny’s career. It would be a year that would see her work with fiercly uncompromising directors ranging from Lars Von Trier to Vincent Gallo, and it would end with her losing her contract at the William Morris Agency.
Von Trier’s masterful and bruising Dogville (2003) opened the year for Sevigny and she more than held her own against award winning performers ranging from Nicole Kidman to Lauren Bacall to Ben Gazzara…not to mention she survived Von Trier and indeed it is the unforgettable Dogville Confessions where we perhaps see Chloe Sevigny at both her most vulnerable and bravest.


The heated and much argued about Dogville couldn’t hold a candle in controversary to Vincent Gallo’s The Brown Bunny (2003), one of the most individualistic and moving American Independent films of the past thirty years. As the very damaged Daisy that haunts Gallo’s character, Sevigny delivers her most poetic work and it's unfortunate that such a powerful turn was lost in the media frenzy surrounding the film’s climatic oral sex scene. The Brown Bunny remains one of the most distinct American films of the decade and Chloe Sevigny’s performance as the ghostly Daisy remains one of the most resonate.


A strong small turn in the striking and rather brilliant Shattered Glass (2003) got lost amidst the furious reaction The Brown Bunny inspired. Without an agency backing her, one might have expected Sevigny to fade from view, a fact that has made her last few years all the more inspiring and remarkable.
Quality roles in the fine Woody Allen film Melinda and Melinda (2004) as well as Jim Jarmusch’s Broken Flowers (2005) followed The Brown Bunny as did her turn in the disappointing Dogville follow-up production Manderlay (2005), and if the remake of Brian De Palma’s Sisters (2006) was a mistake then the same can’t said for David Fincher’s jaw dropping Zodiac (2007), a brilliant and epic piece of work that finds Chloe again delivering another stirring and solid supporting turn amidst some of the other best actors of her generation.
In the past couple of years Chloe Sevigny has maintained a high profile thanks to many striking print ads and a continuing role on the acclaimed HBO series Big Love. Her upcoming features include Barry Munday and The Killing Room. Not surprisingly, Chloe has supporting roles in both, and they will both no doubt continue one of the most interesting and inspiring careers of the past two decades.
Unlike many of her ‘indie’ peers who came out of the nineties, Chloe Sevigny has for the most part shied away from mainstream Hollywood. Even studio made films like Palmetto have at the very least had an independent feel. Chloe Sevigny's unwillingness to buckle to the system is beyond refreshing and at times feels downright heroic. Long may she continue to stay on the outskirts…

For more on Chloe Sevigny, please visit this remarkable fan site, where all of the above images plus thousands of others can be seen.

Inspiring Careers in Modern Cinema: Paz Vega

In a decade filled with an incredible amount of quality performances in films from all over the world, there are few that I value higher than Paz Vega’s remarkably honest, subtle and moving performance in Julio Medem’s extraordinary 2001 film Sex and Lucia. The award winning Spanish film, near my top of the decade, wasn’t the first film for the then 25-year-old Vega, but it was the one that signaled there was something quite special about this surreal, strikingly beautiful and talented young woman from Spain.



Born Paz Campos Trigo on January 2nd, 1976 in Seville, Andalucia, Paz Vega was surrounded by artists growing up, as she lived right in the center of Triana, a part of Seville known for its many writers, artists and painters. Triana is also known for its bullfighting, something that her father participated in, as well as its musical culture, which her sister flourished in as a flamenco dancer and singer.



Paz’s early aspirations were of both a political and athletic nature but after seeing a Lorca stage play in her mid teens all of her attention turned to acting. Paz proved to be as ambitious as she was clearly talented, and she formed her own stage company before even leaving High School. Paz’s college years were spent at the esteemed Centro Andaluz de Teatro, where she studied acting. After a few years of perfecting her craft, Paz relocated to the bustling Madrid and almost immediately she landed her first role, in a Friends styled Spanish television sitcom named Menudo es mi padre.



Vega’s rising star in Spanish television in 1997 and 1998 led her to the big screen, and by the turn of the decade she had a few movies under her belt including three high profile Spanish films from 1999: Zapping, I Will Survive and Nobody Knows Anybody. Paz received solid notices for each but nobody expected the depth and range she would show just two years later, when Julio Medem cast her as the lead in his follow-up to his acclaimed Lovers of the Arctic Circle.



Sex and Lucia is a stunning film. A mesmerizing character study obsessed by sex, memory and death, Medem’s film wowed Spanish and then world audiences in late 2001 and throughout 2002. Controlling the production is Paz Vega’s haunting, bruised and uncompromising performance as the title character. Nominated for a whopping eleven Goya Awards, including a win for Paz, Sex and Lucia alerted audiences that Paz Vega was much more than just another Spanish sex symbol.



Riding on the success of Sex and Lucia and a multitude of comparisons to a young Penelope Cruz, Vega proved her performance wasn’t a fluke with her follow-up work in Javier Balaguer’s tale of domestic abuse, 2001’s Solo Mia, for which she would receive yet another Goya nomination.



2002 proved to be another busy year for the twenty-six year old Vega when she appeared in Pedro Almodovar’s astonishing Talk To Her, the delightful musical The Other Side of the Bed and the interesting Novo for French director Jean-Pierre Limosin. Vega’s work in all three showed her as a remarkably versatile and accomplished actress, as well as being one of the most intensely beautiful women to grace modern day screens.



By the time she appeared in Vincent Aranda’s underrated 2003 production of Carmen, Paz Vega was one one of Spain’s biggest stars, and her face and image were splashed all over the country courtesy of magazine covers, advertisements and modeling assignments. It was no coincidence that Hollywood called soon after and within a year Vega would be making her English language debut.



James L. Brook’s much maligned Spanglish (2004) is an underrated work that didn’t deserve the critical drubbing it took. Starring opposite an excellent Adam Sandler, Vega delivered a moving and winning performance that was unfairly overlooked at Oscar time, even though it was touted as an early favorite. The film’s disappointing failure to connect with audiences and critics hurt Vega’s first introduction to many American filmgoers, and the unfortunate ‘introducing’ credit granted her in the film made matters even worse. It was all a pity as Spanglish is wonderfully played and nicely rendered film, and Vega’s work with Sandler is unforgettable.



Paz Vega took a break after Spanglish to be with her family and in the next year or so she only worked in Spanish television. She returned to the big screen in 2006 with the odd but effective low budget film 10 Items or Less, which teamed her with legendary Oscar winner Morgan Freeman. She returned to Spain after to have her first child and in 2006 she appeared in Ray Loriga’s Theresa, The Body of Christ and The Taviana Brother’s The Lark Farm.



Paz has a couple of films awaiting release including Jada Pinkett Smith’s The Human Contract as well as Dror Soref’s Not Forgotten. Extremely busy, she has four more films in the works and she can currently be seen in Frank Miller’s dazzling (and mark my words, future cult classic) The Spirit where she plays the beautiful but deadly dancer Plaster of Paris.



Whether Paz Vega will ever manage to connect with American audiences remains to be seen. She has though, in Spain’s rich and wonderful modern film community, become one of her home country’s most devastating and popular actors. An actress capable of heavy drama, comedy, eroticism and camp (plus a nice person in her daily life), Paz Vega feels like a legend in the making. Her performance in Sex and Lucia alone already makes her one in my book.



***This article was written as a tribute to Paz on her 33rd birthday. Biographical information and photos were gathered from the essential Paz Vega online, which can be visited here***