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Julia Fiona Roberts (28 October 1967) is
an Academy Award-winning American film actress and
former fashion model. She shot to fame during the early
1990s after starring in the romantic comedy, Pretty
Woman, opposite Richard Gere. Since then, Roberts has
become the highest-paid actress in the world, topping
the Hollywood Reporter's annual power list of
top-earning female stars for four consecutive years
(2002-2005). Her career includes films such as Pretty
Woman, Runaway Bride, and Ocean's Eleven, which have
collectively earned box office receipts well over $2
billion.
She won the Best Actress Academy Award in 2001 for her
critically praised turn as the title character in Erin
Brockovich after two previous nominations during the
1990s. For her fame and wholesome image, she is often
referred to as "America's Sweetheart". An
unprecedented $25 million was paid to Roberts for her
role in 2003's Mona Lisa Smile.
As of 2007, Roberts' net worth was
estimated around US$140,000,000. She was also the first
actress to appear on the cover of Vogue and the first
woman to land on the cover of GQ. She has been named one
of People magazine's "50 Most Beautiful People in
the World" a record-setting eleven times, tied with
Halle Berry. In 2001 Ladies Home Journal ranked her as
the 11th most powerful woman in America beating out then
national security advisor Condoleeza Rice and first lady
Laura Bush.
Early life: It is commonly mistaken that Julia's
birth name is "Julie," however, Julia has said
in interviews that "Julie" was a nickname
given to her by classmates in elementary school, and she
never took well to it. Roberts was born in Smyrna,
Georgia. Her father, Walter Grady Roberts, was a vacuum
cleaner salesman, and her Minneapolis, Minnesota-born
mother, Betty Lou Bredemus, was a one-time church
secretary and a real estate agent.
Her parents, one-time actors and playwrights, met while
performing theatrical productions for the armed forces
and later co-founded the Atlanta Actors and Writers
Workshop in Georgia; the two divorced in 1971. Her
mother later re-married to Michael Motes. Roberts's
father died of cancer when she was 10. Her elder
brother, Eric Roberts, from whom she is estranged, is
also an actor, as is her niece, Emma Roberts, whom she
would often take along on sets when she was younger.
Roberts wanted to be a veterinarian as a child, but soon
after graduating from Smyrna's Campbell High School, and
attending Georgia State University, she headed to New
York to join her sister and pursue a career in acting.
Once there, she signed with the Click modeling agency
and enrolled in acting classes. She reverted to her
original name "Julia Roberts" when she found
that there was already a "Julie Roberts"
registered with the Screen Actors Guild.
1986—1989, Early career: Roberts made her film
debut playing a supporting role opposite her brother,
Eric, in Blood Red (she gets just two words of
dialogue), which, although completed in 1986, was not
released until 1989. She once appeared on Sesame Street
opposite the character Elmo, demonstrating her ability
to change emotions. Roberts first caught the attention
of moviegoers with her performance in the independent
film Mystic Pizza in 1988; the same year she had a role
in the last episode of season four of Miami Vice. The
following year she was featured in Steel Magnolias as a
young bride battling diabetes and garnered her first
Oscar nomination (as Best Supporting Actress) for her
performance.
1990—2000, Breakout role and eventual success:
Roberts first catapulted to worldwide fame when she
co-starred with Richard Gere in the Cinderella story
Pretty Woman in 1990. The role also earned her a second
Oscar nod, this time as Best Actress. Her next box
office success was the thriller Sleeping with the Enemy,
playing a battered wife who escapes her demented husband
and starts a new life in Iowa.
She played Tinkerbell in Steven
Spielberg's Hook in 1991, which was followed by a
two-year period of no acting roles other than a cameo
appearance in Robert Altman's The Player (1992). In
early 1993, she was the subject of a People magazine
cover story asking, "What Happened to Julia
Roberts?"
In 1993, she co-starred with Denzel Washington in the
successful The Pelican Brief, based on the John Grisham
novel. She also starred alongside Liam Neeson in the
1996 film Michael Collins. Over the next few years, she
starred in a series of films that were critical and
commercial failures, primarily because she was cast in
roles that strayed too far from her film persona. She
broke her losing streak with the hugely popular comedy
My Best Friend's Wedding (1997), and eventually regained
her earlier reputation as an actress who could open a
movie and guarantee box office success. She then starred
with Hugh Grant in the popular 1999 film Notting Hill.
In that same year she also starred in Runaway Bride,
another movie with the famous Julia Roberts-Richard Gere
duo.
2001—2006, continued success: In 2001, she won
critical acclaim and finally received a Best Actress
Oscar for her portrayal of Erin Brockovich, who helped
wage a successful lawsuit against energy giant Pacific
Gas & Electric. Whilst presenting the Best Actor
Award to Denzel Washington the following year she made a
gaff when she said she was glad Tom Conti wasn't there.
She meant the conductor Bill Conti who tried to hasten
the conclusion of her speech the previous year but named
the British actor instead. Subsequently, Roberts would
team up with Erin Brockovich director Steven Soderbergh
for three more films: Ocean's Eleven, Full Frontal, and
Ocean's Twelve.
2006—present, hiatus: Roberts recently enjoyed
her Broadway debut as Nan in Three Days of Rain opposite
Alias and Kitchen Confidential star Bradley Cooper, and
The 40 Year Old Virgin star, Paul Rudd, at the Bernard
B. Jacobs Theatre. Although the play grossed nearly one
million dollars in ticket sales its first week out and
continued to be a commercial success throughout its
limited run, most critics have heavily criticized
Roberts' performance and the play itself.
The New York Times' critic Ben Brantly,
a self proclaimed 'Juliaholic', described her as being
fraught with "self-consciousness (especially in the
first act) [and] only glancingly acquainted with the two
characters she plays." Three Days of Rain received
two Tony Award nominations in stage design categories,
but took home neither prize. Julia Roberts did, however,
receive a Broadway.com audience award (a minor
theatrical prize) for her performance.
Influence: As of February 25, 2007, Roberts's
films have grossed $2,203,765,451 at the American box
office making her the biggest female movie star in
history and reaching this feat with only thirty films to
her name. She was also placed at the pinnacle of the
Ulmer Scale, a comprehensive guide to the global star
power of actors and directors in independent and studio
films created by James Ulmer, ahead of such other
luminaries as Tom Cruise and Tom Hanks. This was partly
owing to her ability to attract filmgoers solely on the
basis of her name's appearance above the title and
without the support of a male co-star, something few
other actresses are able to do.
Personal life: Roberts's personal life has often
been in the spotlight, a fact reflected in her Notting
Hill, a romantic comedy about a famous actress falling
for a bookstore owner played by Hugh Grant. Her
character, Anna Scott, was said to be closely modeled on
Roberts herself. (When asked in one scene how much she
was paid to appear in a movie, Scott replies
"fifteen million dollars" — precisely the
amount Roberts had received to appear in the film.)
Relationships: Roberts' has had numereous famous
boyfriends, including Kiefer Sutherland, Lyle Lovett,
Jason Patric, Daniel Day-Lewis, Matthew Perry, Dylan
Walsh. Roberts met Kiefer Sutherland, her co-star in
Flatliners from 1990. Sutherland left his wife and
children and moved in with Roberts. In August 1990,
Roberts and Sutherland announced their engagement, with
a wedding of 14 June 1991.
Roberts cancelled the wedding when she
discovered Sutherland had had an affair with a stripper
named Amanda Rice. Roberts went to Europe with Jason
Patric after she and Sutherland broke up. Eventually,
she married country singer Lyle Lovett after the couple
had known each other for a few weeks.The wedding was
planned on very short notice and was held in Marion,
Indiana. Two years later, in March 1995, the couple
announced that they were separating. This started a
string of many, many handsome famous boyfriends and
relationships.
For the Christmas '98 premiere of Stepmom, Roberts
appeared with television actor Benjamin Bratt. In late
June 2001, Roberts and Bratt announced they were
breaking up. "It's come to a kind and
tender-hearted end," she said of their
relationship. Roberts also briefly dated Friends star
Matthew Perry and actor Daniel Day-Lewis. For a time,
she lived with actor Liam Neeson.
Roberts met her current husband, cinematographer Danny
Moder, on the set of her movie The Mexican in 2000. He
was already married to Vera Steinberg Moder when they
began an affair. Vera was said to be devastated and did
not want to lose her husband, however Julia was
determined that Danny would divorce his wife and marry
her. Julia even agreed to pay Vera $250,000.00 to agree
to divorce Danny so he could be free to marry her. Julia
wore a t-shirt with 'A low Vera' on it that summer as a
sign of protest against Vera holding up the divorce
proceedings.
As soon as the divorce was official,
Roberts and Moder were quickly married on Fourth of
July, 2002, at her ranch in Taos, New Mexico. On
November 28, 2004, they became the parents of fraternal
twins, daughter Hazel Patricia and son Phinnaeus Walter,
and they are expecting their third child and second boy
in July 2007. Roberts bought a penthouse in Manhattan's
Gramercy Park neighborhood. She reportedly loves to shop
anonymously, buying her own organic greens on weekends
at the market in nearby Union Square. She and her family
divide their time between their homes in New York City,
Malibu, California, and their 50-acre retreat in Taos.
Charities: Roberts has a production company
called Red Om Films ("Moder" spelled
backwards; formerly "Shoelace Productions")
and has given of her time and resources to Unicef as
well as to other charitable organizations."In the
Spring of 1995, Roberts, 27, an enthusiastic supporter
of UNICEF, asked if she could meet some of the relief
agency's neediest recipients. And so, on May 10, she
arrived in Port-au-Prince 'to educate myself.' The
poverty she found was overwhelming. 'My heart is just
bursting,' she said. Unicef officials hope her six-day
visit will trigger an outburst of giving: $10 million in
aid is still needed.
Roberts herself had no need for
journalists, whom she kept at arm's length. 'You in the
orange shirt!' she snapped at one cameraman. 'Out!' She
did turn on the charm for Haiti's President
Jean-Bertrand Aristide, 42, who glowingly described
Roberts as a 'Hollywood Haitian'. Asked by a reporter if
she would consider making a movie in Haiti, Roberts
replied, 'Certainly. Are you offering me a script?' No,
but Aristide may have come up with a title."
In 2000, Julia narrated "Silent Angels", a
documentary about Rett syndrome, which was shot in Los
Angeles, Baltimore and New York. The documentary is
designed to help raise public awareness about the
disease.
In July 2006, Earth Biofuels announced that Roberts
became a spokeswoman for the company and will be
chairman of the company’s newly formed Advisory Board
promoting the use of renewable fuels such as biodiesel
and ethanol. |
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