Claire Danes Biography

Summary

"Claire Catherine Danes" (born on April 12, 1979) is a Golden Globe Award-winning and Emmy Award-nominated American film, television, and theater actress.

Biography

Early life

Danes was born in Manhattan to Christopher Danes, a computer consultant and former architectural photographer, and Carla, a day care provider, painter, and textile designer who would later serve as Claire's manager. Danes has described her background as being 'as WASPy as you can get'; her paternal grandfather, Gibson A. Danes, was the dean of the art and architecture school at Yale University. She has a brother, Asa, who graduated from Oberlin College and works as a litigation attorney for the law firm of Paul Hastings.

Danes attended the Dalton School in New York City, the Professional Performing Arts School in New York City, and the exclusive private high school "Lycée Français de Los Angeles" in Los Angeles, California. In 1998, Danes went to Yale University (her father's alma mater). After studying for two years as a psychology major, she dropped out of Yale to focus on her film career.

Career

Danes is perhaps most famous for bringing Angela Chase to life in the 1994 television drama series "My So-Called Life", for which she won a Golden Globe Award and received an Emmy nomination. She played Elizabeth ('Beth') March in the 1994 movie adaption of "Little Women". She also appeared as Holly Hunter's daughter in "Home For The Holidays", which was directed by Jodie Foster. This was followed by her role as Juliet in Baz Luhrmann's 1996 film "William Shakespeare's Romeo + Juliet", co-starring Leonardo DiCaprio. The same year she turned down the lead role of Rose DeWitt Bukater in "Titanic" due to exhaustion from "Romeo + Juliet". Her first role in an animated feature came in 1999 with the English version of "Princess Mononoke". During the same year, she took the lead role in "Brokedown Palace", alongside Kate Beckinsale and Bill Pullman.

In 2002, Danes starred opposite Susan Sarandon and Kieran Culkin in "Igby Goes Down". She later co-starred as Meryl Streep's daughter in the Oscar-nominated "The Hours", with Nicole Kidman, Julianne Moore, and Ed Harris. The following year, she was cast in "Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines", and "Stage Beauty" in 2004. She earned critical acclaim in 2005 when she starred in Steve Martin's "Shopgirl" alongside Martin and Jason Schwartzman, and in "The Family Stone" opposite Sarah Jessica Parker and Diane Keaton. In 2007, Danes appeared in the fantasy epic "Stardust", which she described as a 'classic model of romantic comedy', opposite Charlie Cox, Michelle Pfeiffer, Robert De Niro, and Sienna Miller, and will appear in "The Flock", opposite Richard Gere.

Danes appeared in Off-Broadway plays including "Happiness", "Punk Ballet", and "Kids On Stage", in which she choreographed her own solo dance. She also wrote the introduction to Neil Gaiman's "Death: The Time of Your Life". Danes also auditioned for the role of Lois Lane in "Superman Returns" before the role went to Kate Bosworth.

In March 2007, Danes appeared with Patrick Wilson in a television commercial for the Gap in which the pair dances to the song 'Anything You Can Do' from the musical "Annie Get Your Gun". Danes has recently appeared onstage at Manhattan's PS122, an iconic avant-garde performance space, in a series of dance pieces by the choreographer Tamar Rogoff. Danes made her stage debut at PS122 as a child.

On October 19 2007, Danes made her Broadway debut in the revival of George Bernard Shaw's "Pygmalion", starring as Eliza Doolittle.

Personal life

After meeting at her birthday party, she and Australian singer Ben Lee dated for almost six years, but their relationship ended in 2003. Since 2004 she dated her "Stage Beauty" and "Princess Mononoke" co-star Billy Crudup, but this resulted in bad publicity for both, as he had left his previous longtime partner, actress Mary-Louise Parker, 7 months pregnant. Even though both vehemently denied that they had gotten involved at this point, the pressure was too much for a long time and eventually the pair split in December 2006. Additionally, she has dated Andrew Dorff, actor Stephen Dorff's younger brother, and Matt Damon. Danes stated on the 27 June 2007 episode of "Late Show with David Letterman" that she is dating "Evening" co-star Hugh Dancy.

Claire Danes and her Stardust Co-star, Charlie Cox, have been great friends ever since filming together in the movie. Charlie Cox confirmed this during his interview with Rove.

Danes had her first onscreen kiss in an episode of My So-Called Life before she had one in real life.

Controversy

In 1998, just after the filming of "Brokedown Palace" in Manila, she was quoted in "Vogue" as saying that Manila was a 'ghastly and weird city'. She further remarked in "Premiere" that the city, 'smelled of cockroaches, with rats all over and that there is no sewage system and the people do not have anything -- no arms, no legs, no eyes'. Kim Atienza, son of then-Mayor of Manila, Lito Atienza, responded to the comments by saying that, 'those are irresponsible, bigoted and sweeping statements that we cannot accept'. Her films were subsequently banned from being screened in the Philippines. Joseph Estrada, then-President of the Philippines, condemned her publicly, and she was declared persona non grata. Shortly after the incident, Danes issued an apology in "Entertainment Weekly" to the City of Manila.