Quick Facts
- NAME: Ellen Burstyn
- OCCUPATION: Actress
- BIRTH DATE: December 07, 1932 (Age: 80)
- PLACE OF BIRTH: Detroit, Michigan
- Originally: Edna Rae Gillooly
- AKA: Ellen McRae
- ZODIAC SIGN: Sagittarius
Best Known For
Actress Ellen Burstyn played the mother in The Exorcist and earned an Oscar for her role in Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore.
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Play NowEllen Burstyn. (2013). The Biography Channel website. Retrieved 11:15, May 22, 2013, from http://www.biography.com/people/ellen-burstyn-9542388.
Ellen Burstyn. [Internet]. 2013. The Biography Channel website. Available from: http://www.biography.com/people/ellen-burstyn-9542388 [Accessed 22 May 2013].
"Ellen Burstyn." 2013. The Biography Channel website. May 22 2013, 11:15 http://www.biography.com/people/ellen-burstyn-9542388.
"Ellen Burstyn," The Biography Channel website, 2013, http://www.biography.com/people/ellen-burstyn-9542388 [accessed May 22, 2013].
"Ellen Burstyn," The Biography Channel website, http://www.biography.com/people/ellen-burstyn-9542388 (accessed May 22, 2013).
Ellen Burstyn [Internet]. The Biography Channel website; 2013 [cited 2013 May 22] Available from: http://www.biography.com/people/ellen-burstyn-9542388.
Ellen Burstyn, http://www.biography.com/people/ellen-burstyn-9542388 (last visited May 22, 2013).
Ellen Burstyn. The Biography Channel website. 2013. Available at: http://www.biography.com/people/ellen-burstyn-9542388. Accessed May 22, 2013.
Jean Harris. In addition to such dramatic TV movies as Surviving (1985), Into Thin Air (1985), and the Emmy-nominated Pack of Lies (1987), Burstyn tried her hand at comedy with her own series,
The Ellen Burstyn Show (1986-87).
Burstyn turned in a number of small, if memorable, performances in a variety of more recent films, including
How to Make an American Quilt (1995), starring Winona Ryder, and
The Spitfire Grill (1996). In 1998, she was featured as part of the impressive ensemble cast of
Playing By Heart, also featuring Sean Connery, Gena Rowlands, and Angelina Jolie, playing a woman dealing with her grown son's battle with AIDS.
Recent Roles
In 2000, Burstyn played to a decidedly younger audience with her costarring role opposite teen heartthrob Jonathan Taylor Thomas in the little-seen Walking Across Egypt. She was also featured in a small role in the crime drama The Yards, starring Mark Wahlberg, James Caan, and Joaquin Phoenix. On the small screen, she was a regular on the new comedy series That's Life, playing the busybody mother of a grown woman who decides to go back to college to get her degree. By far her crowning achievement of that year, however, was her harrowing portrayal of a woman addicted to diet pills in the edgy, disturbing drama Requiem for a Dream, directed by Darren Aronofsky. The performance earned Burstyn a sixth overall Academy Award nomination, her fifth for Best Actress.Burstyn has been married and divorced three times - to poet William C. Alexander (1950-55), director Paul Roberts (1957-59), and actor Neil Burstyn (1960-1971). She and Neil Burstyn adopted a son, Jefferson. In 2000, Burstyn became president of the Actors Studio.
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View groupIn entertainment, where the line between fiction and reality is often blurry, names are a crucial part of a celebrity's image. Stage names are often chosen to make an actor or musician's name easier to pronounce or remember, or simply to make it sounds more attractive. Here are famous celebrities who have changed their names.
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