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Justine Bateman coming to Wisteria Lane

Posted by Vogt
at May 28, 2008

Justine BatemanThere’s going to be a new lady swinging down Wisteria Lane this spring. Entertainment Tonight reported that Justine Bateman has signed onto Desperate Housewives for a few episodes. The actress, who will forever be remembered for playing Alex P. Keaton — Michael J. Fox’s — sister Mallory on Family Ties, will be playing “a hip artist living with Gabby and Carlos.”

Hmm…knowing Desperate Housewives creator Marc Cherry’s penchant for using Stephen Sondheim songs as episode titles, I think the song “There’s Always A Woman” might be a good one to describe Justine’s role, assuming she’s there to muck up the Solis’ reconciliation.

It wouldn’t be the first time Justine’s played the other woman. Last season on another ABC dramedy, Men In Trees, she was Lynn, Jack’s long-lost love who showed up out of nowhere — just as Jack and Marin were ready to commit to their relationship. Lynn was preggers — by another guy — and stuck around long enough to be a bother.

Desperate Housewives will be back with new episodes on April 13. The date for the Bateman arc has yet to be announced.

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Geena Davis Biography

Posted by Vogt
at May 9, 2008

Geena Davis.jpg

Since the early 1980s, this statuesque (about 6′) former fashion model has carefully crafted a winning screen persona that has made her one of Hollywood’s most sought-after actors. While Davis’ somewhat goofy charm has been well deployed in quirky comedies (e.g., “Fletch” 1985; “Beetlejuice” 1988; “Quick Change” 1990), she has also displayed a flair for light drama, notably with an Oscar-winning turn in Lawrence Kasdan’s “The Accidental Tourist” (1988). Strikingly attractive with just a touch of gawkiness, Davis projected an all but irresistible friendliness and vulnerability in her early appearances. More often than not, her best characterizations had her starting out as an untried and fairly ditsy naif who is forced to make decisions that allow her to grow over the course of the narrative. Davis has also avoided much of the stereotypical fare offered contemporary actresses in that she’s never played a character who was dying of a terminal disease, been cast as a hooker (with a heart of gold or otherwise) or portrayed a conventional woman in peril. Her imposing physique has given her rare credibility to play athletes and other unusually physical female roles.

Davis first registered on TV in 1982 in the briefly recurring role of the guileless maid Karen Nicholson hired by precocious young conservative Alex P Keaton (Michael J Fox) on the hit NBC sitcom “Family Ties”. Davis’ slightly daft domestic enchanted both her diminutive employer and a huge primetime audience. She next surfaced as Wendy Killian, an ingenuous research assistant, providing one of several foils to Dabney Coleman’s titular detestable talk show host “Buffalo Bill” (NBC, 1983-84) in that short-lived but highly acclaimed sitcom. Davis graduated to sitcom lead as “Sara” (NBC, 1985), a young single attorney sharing a San Francisco storefront apartment with three other lawyers. This failed but inoffensive attempt to recreate “The Mary Tyler Moore Show” for the 80s boasted a sterling supporting cast that included Alfre Woodard, Bill Maher and Bronson Pinchot. But success and stardom for the actress would come in the movies.

Davis made her feature debut as a scantily clad soap-opera performer who innocently shares a dressing room with the cross-dressing Dustin Hoffman in “Tootsie” (1982). She graduated to leads with David Cronenberg’s ickily transcendent remake of “The Fly” (1986), cast opposite Jeff Goldblum whom she married the following year. Rarely has film offered a more convincing depiction of two bright and interesting people falling in love. Offscreen, Goldblum and Davis made for a great celebrity couple: both were long, lean, a little loopy and seemingly very much in love and they gave memorably entertaining interviews. The pair seemed like a Nick and Nora Charles for postmodern times. (Their marriage, however, faltered and they filed for divorce in 1990.)

Davis surprised many by winning an Oscar for her portrayal of the kooky dog-trainer who wins the heart of a traumatized William Hurt in Lawrence Kasdan’s comedy-drama “The Accidental Tourist”. She made a much greater impact–and earned her first Best Actress nod from the Academy–as Thelma, an oppressed and none-too-brainy housewife who finds notoriety, liberation and herself on an outlaw road trip in Ridley Scott’s seminal “Thelma & Louise” (1991). Filmed shortly after Davis’ divorce from Goldblum, this female buddy movie became a cult favorite for many feminists and Davis and co-star Susan Sarandon assumed the status of a distaff Redford and Newman. She rose capably above the material in Penny Marshall’s popular period baseball comedy-drama, “A League of Their Own” (1992). Impressively serious amid the sentimental shenanigans, Davis won kudos for her portrayal of Dottie Hinson, a softball player in rural Oregon awaiting the return of her husband from overseas in WWII. Additionally, she proved convincing as the catcher and star player of a pro women’s ball team. Davis fared less well that same year as a career-driven reporter tracking down the “Hero” (Dustin Hoffman or Andy Garcia) who saved a plane full of crash survivors from death by smoke inhalation. The screenplay of this attempt at contemporary Capra-corn, though, received more criticism than the female lead.

In 1993, Davis married transplanted Finnish action flick helmer Renny Harlin and the pair formed Forge Productions the following year. “Angie” (1994) offered a bit of a stretch for the striking WASPish leading lady as she played a working-class Italian-American Brooklynite who gets pregnant out of wedlock yet refuses to do the conventional right thing. Davis garnered reasonable reviews for her deft handling of a role conceived for Madonna but audiences steered clear of the light comedy-drama. Nor did they cast their vote later that year for “Speechless”, a romantic comedy set in the world of politics. Starring opposite “Beetlejuice” co-star Michael Keaton as competing speech writers who fall in love, Davis also made her co-producing debut (with Harlin) on this project. She moved up to executive producer on the made-for-cable courtroom thriller “Mistrial” (HBO, 1996).

Married as she was to an action specialist, Davis cannot be faulted for trying her hand at the genre. The potential boost in international box-office clout seemed a worthy prize as the producing duo joined forces for the lavish pirate adventure “Cutthroat Island” (1995). Helmed by Harlin, the film boasted elaborate stunts, vibrant lensing, meticulous production design and impressive battle sequences. On the other hand, the conventional derring-do and lame scripting all but neutralized Davis’ quirky appeal. That flaw, along with poor pacing and an all but irrelevant male lead (Matthew Modine), helped sink this $100 million white elephant at the box office, which also took a movie studio–the already troubled Carolco–down with it to the ocean floor. In the plus column, Davis performed her action chores with considerable aplomb. She and Harlin sprang into action again with “The Long Kiss Goodnight (1996). Armed with a hot Shane Black script, ace supporting player Samuel L. Jackson and some $70 million, the film delivered the action goods and a breezy tone but disappointing box office. Still, Davis charmed many with her initially tongue-in-cheek portrait of a suburban housewife whose amnesia prevents her from remembering her past as a top-ranked government assassin. Her attempt to transition back into television with the ABC sitcom “The Geena Davis Show” (2000-2001) playing a materialistic woman whose whirlwind romance takes her from singlehood to being the married mother of two after only six dates also failed to score with audiences.

Despite these commercial and critical setbacks (not to mention personal–she and Harlin ultimately divorced in 1998), Davis found a hit with the popular children’s film “Stuart Little” (1999), charming audiences as the winsome wife and mother Eleanor Little, who is perfectly nonplussed that her adopted son is a talking white mouse. She would also reprise the role for the 2002 sequel, “Stuart Little 2.” The actress would then give television yet another go, taking the lead in producer Rod Lurie’s political-minded series “Commander in Chief” (ABC, 2005 - ) as Mackenzie Allen, a political independent who became vice president as a lure for women voters who, after the death of her running mate, takes to the Oval Office as president despite strong opposition from both her allies and her enemies.

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Courteney Cox Arquette Biography

Posted by Vogt
at May 9, 2008

Courteney Cox Arquette.jpg

A whisper-thin, raven-haired beauty of TV and film, Courteney Cox first registered with audiences when she was plucked from the crowd by Bruce Springsteen in the Brian De Palma-directed video for The Boss’ hit 1984 single “Dancing in the Dark”. Work for the prestigious Ford Modeling Agency and appearances in Noxzema and Maybelline commercials (among others) and a bit part on the CBS soap “As the World Turns” preceded the video, after which she snagged a regular role in the short-lived primetime series “Misfits of Science” (NBC, 1985-86). Cox then joined the cast of the hit NBC sitcom “Family Ties” for the final two seasons (1987-89) as the brainy girlfriend of Alex P Keaton (Michael J Fox). She made the leap to the big screen, appearing in the little-seen caper film “Down Twisted” and the children’s sci-fi epic “Masters of the Universe” (both 1987), and “Cocoon: The Return” (1988), none of which registered much with critics or audiences.

For the rest of the 80s and into the early 90s, Cox alternated between TV and feature films, often trading on her girl-next-door qualities. While she landed the female lead opposite Jim Carrey in the smash hit “Ace Ventura: Pet Detective” (1994), she was overshadowed by the flashy antics of her co-star. Cox finally achieved small screen stardom as the neurotic aspiring chef Monica Geller, serving as the anchor of the ensemble, in the hit sitcom “Friends” (NBC, 1994-2004)–initially viewed as the star of the show, she easily settled into the emerging ensemble and, after a few seasons of playing Monica relatively straight, she showed her comedic chops as the character’s quirks–such as her hyper-cleanliness–emerged. She displayed her dramatic prowess as a blind rape victim in the made-for-cable movie “Sketch Artist II: Hands that See” (Showtime, 1995) before becoming the first of the “Friends” to score a big screen hit with Wes Craven’s “Scream” (1996). Cast against type as savvy, ambitious TV newscaster Gale Weathers, Cox delivered a strong performance and she reprised the part in the inevitable sequels “Scream 2″ (1997) and “Scream 3″ (2000). Unfortunately, “Commandments” (both 1997), in which she portrayed the unhappy wife of Anthony LaPaglia, embarking on an affair with her brother-in-law (Aidan Quinn), failed to mine the versatility she displayed in the Craven movies. After a string of roles in unimpressive films–”3000 Miles to Graceland,” “The Shrink Is In” and “Get Well Soon” (all 2001), Cox focused primarily on her series and her marriage to her “Scream” co-star David Arquette, whom she married in 1999 (the actress also added the Arquette name to her professional credits). As the final season of “Friends” wound down in 2004, Cox Arquette, had her share of options, motherhood was looming, she’d signed to appear in a slate of feature films, and she ahd her husband had already served as executive producers and design consultants on the home improvement reality series “Mix It Up” (2003-2004) on the cable network WE: Women’s Entertainment, a series that focused on helping couples blend their disparate design senisbilities when they move in together.

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