| Amy Irving | |
|---|---|
at the Governor's Ball party, after the 1989 Academy Awards |
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| Born | Amy Davis Irving September 10, 1953 Palo Alto, California, U.S. |
| Occupation | Actress |
| Years active | 1975–present |
| Spouse | Steven Spielberg (1985–1989; divorced: 1 child) Bruno Barreto (1996–2005; divorced: 1 child) Kenneth Bowser (2007–present) |
Amy Davis Irving (born September 10, 1953) is an American actress, known for her roles in the films Crossing Delancey, The Fury, Carrie, and Yentl as well as acclaimed roles on Broadway and Off-Broadway. She has been nominated for an Academy Award, two Golden Globes, and has won an Obie award. She is also known for marrying director Steven Spielberg; they divorced in 1989 after four years of marriage, with Irving receiving a settlement of 100 million dollars.
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Irving was born in Palo Alto, California, the daughter of film and stage director Jules Irving (né Jules Israel) and actress Priscilla Pointer. Irving's brother is writer/director David Irving (not the British author of the same name) and her sister is singer/teacher of deaf children Katie Irving. Her father was Jewish and her mother is of Cherokee and Welsh background.[1] She was raised in the Christian Science faith.[1]
In the late 1960s and early 1970s, Irving attended the American Conservatory Theater in San Francisco, where she appeared in several of its productions. She also trained at the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art, and made her off-Broadway debut when she was 17, in a production titled And Chocolate on Her Chin. She is a graduate of the Professional Children's School, in Manhattan, New York.
Irving made her stage debut aged two-and-a-half portraying a bit part character named Princess Primrose in a play her father directed. She also had a walk-on role in the 1965-66 Broadway show The Country Wife at age 12, selling Stacy Keach a hamster in a crowd scene. The play was directed by family friend Robert Symonds, who became her stepfather after the death of Jules Irving, the owner/operator of Lincoln Center. Within six months of returning to Los Angeles from London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art in the mid-1970s, Irving was cast in a major motion picture and was working on various TV projects such as guest spots in Police Woman, Happy Days, and a lead role in the mini-series epic Once an Eagle opposite veterans at the time Sam Elliott, Glenn Ford and a young Melanie Griffith. She also played Juliet in Romeo and Juliet at the Los Angeles Free Shakespeare Theatre in 1975, and returned to the role at the Seattle Repertory Theatre from 1982 to 1983.
After auditioning and losing the role of Princess Leia in Star Wars, Irving starred in the Brian DePalma-directed films The Fury as Gillian Bellaver, and Carrie as Sue Snell (in which she co-starred with her mother). Then, in 1999, she went on to do her role as Sue Snell "The Rage: Carrie 2", and was the school counselor, mainly for Rachel, the main character. She also starred with Richard Dreyfuss in 1980's The Competition; the same year also saw the release of Honeysuckle Rose; the 1983 film Yentl (for which she was nominated for an Oscar), in Susan Sandler's 1988 film Crossing Delancey (for which she was nominated for a Golden Globe) as Isabelle, and Woody Allen's 1997 film Deconstructing Harry. Micki + Maude, directed by Blake Edwards and starring Dudley Moore was a hit for her in 1984. She supplied the singing voice for Jessica Rabbit in the animated film Who Framed Roger Rabbit. Irving also appeared in the TV show Alias as Emily Sloane, portrayed Princess Anjuli in the big-budget miniseries epic The Far Pavilions and headlined the lavish TV production Anastasia: The Mystery of Anna. More recently Irving appeared in the films Traffic (2000), Tuck Everlasting (2002), Thirteen Conversations About One Thing (2002) and an episode of Law & Order: Special Victims Unit in 2001.
Irving's stage work includes on-Broadway shows such as Amadeus (replacing Jane Seymour due to pregnancy) at the Broadhurst Theatre for nine months, Heartbreak House with Rex Harrison at the Circle in the Square Theatre, Broken Glass at the Booth Theatre and Three Sisters with Jeanne Tripplehorn and Lili Taylor at the Roundabout Theatre. Additional off-Broadway credits include: The Heidi Chronicles, The Road to Mecca, The Vagina Monologues in both London and New York, The Glass Menagerie with her mother, Celadine, a world premiere at George Street Playhouse in New Brunswick, NJ and the 2006 one-woman play A Safe Harbor for Elizabeth Bishop, by Marta Góes, which was a Primary Stages production at the 59E59 Theaters. In 1994, Irving and Anthony Hopkins hosted the 48th Tony Awards at the Gershwin Theatre, New York.
Along with various other shows, Irving's last Broadway appearance was in the American premiere of Tom Stoppard's The Coast of Utopia at New York's Lincoln Center during its 2006–07 season. In 2009, she played the title role in Saint Joan, in an audio version by the Hollywood Theater of the Ear.
In May 2010, Irving made her Opera Theatre of Saint Louis debut in the role of Desiree Armfeldt in Isaac Mizrahi's highly anticipated directorial debut of Stephen Sondheim's A Little Night Music.
In early October 2010, Irving guest-starred in the third episode of Fox's returning series, House M.D..[2]
She lives in New York City.
Irving received an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress for her performance in the film Yentl, Golden Globe nominations for her performances in the films Anastasia: The Mystery of Anna and Crossing Delancey, and an Obie Award for her stage performance in The Road to Mecca.
Irving holds the distinction of being one of only two people to be nominated for both an Oscar and a Razzie Award for the same performance. Irving was nominated for both Best and Worst Supporting Actress for her work in Yentl. Only James Coco achieved the same feat for his work in Only When I Laugh. She was the winner of the category Worst Supporting Actress at the first annual Razzie Awards in 1981 for her film Honeysuckle Rose, beating actresses including Betsy Palmer for Friday the 13th and Elizabeth Ashley for Windows.
Irving dated American film director Steven Spielberg from 1976 to 1979. She then had a relationship with Willie Nelson, her co-star in the film Honeysuckle Rose, which soon fizzled out. The breakup with Spielberg cost her the role of Marion Ravenwood in Raiders of the Lost Ark, which he was offering to her at the time[3] but they soon got back together and finally married from 1985 to 1989; upon their divorce she received an estimated $100 million settlement after a judge controversially vacated a prenuptial agreement written on a napkin. In 1990 she became romantically and professionally involved with the Brazilian film director Bruno Barreto; they were married in 1996 and divorced in 2005. She has two sons, Max Samuel (with Spielberg) (born June 13, 1985), and Gabriel Davis (with Barreto) (born May 4, 1990). She is married to Kenneth Bowser, Jr., a documentary film maker, most notable for making Easy Riders, Raging Bulls: How the Sex, Drugs and Rock 'N' Roll Generation Saved Hollywood, an adaptation of a book by Peter Biskind.