Marisa Tomei
Marisa Tomei (born December 4, 1964) is an American stage, film and television actress. Tomei first came to prominence as a supporting cast member on The Cosby Show spinoff A Different World in 1987.She won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for her performance in My Cousin Vinny (1992). She received subsequent nominations for her performances in In the Bedroom (2001) and The Wrestler (2008).Her most commercially successful films to date are What Women Want (2000), Anger Management (2003) and followed by Wild Hogs (2007). She received critical acclaim for her performances in Unhook the Stars (1996), Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead (2007) and The Wrestler (2008).
Tomei followed up As the World Turns, in 1987, with a role on the sitcom A Different World. Her breakthrough comedic performance came in My Cousin Vinny (1992), for which she won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress. After her Oscar win, she received a Screen Actor’s Guild Award nomination for Outstanding Female Supporting Actor for Nick Cassavetes’ Unhook the Stars. Next, she received an American Comedy Award nomination for Funniest Supporting Actress for Tamara Jenkins’ Slums of Beverly Hills. She was nominated for a Satellite Award, as Best Supporting Actress for What Women Want.
Former Saturday Night Live cast member Jay Mohr wrote in his book Gasping for Airtime that, as guest host in October 1994, Tomei insisted that a proposed sketch about another actress not be used because she didn’t like the idea of making fun of her, which displeased the writers and performers, given the show’s penchant for satirizing celebrities.
In 1996, Tomei made a guest appearance on the sitcom Seinfeld, playing herself in the two-part episode “The Cadillac”. In this episode, George attempts to get a date with Tomei through a friend of Elaine. She has also made an appearance on The Simpsons, as movie star Sara Sloane who falls in love with Ned Flanders.
She received her first Golden Globe Award nomination and her second Academy Award-nomination for Best Supporting Actress in Todd Field’s In The Bedroom (2001).Tomei at the 81st Academy Awards in February 2009
In 2003, Tomei appeared in the hit Anger Management with Adam Sandler and Jack Nicholson. In 2005, she was featured in an ad campaign for Hanes with the slogan “Look who we’ve got our Hanes on now”, featuring various other celebrities including Michael Jordan, Jennifer Love Hewitt, Damon Wayans, Matthew Perry and, on Spanish-language advertising, Aracely Arambula and Pablo Montero.
In the early 1990s, Tomei dated Robert Downey, Jr. (her co-star in Chaplin and Only You).In 1999, she dated actor Dana Ashbrook and had a relationship with playwright Frank Pugliese, living with him in Greenwich Village.Tomei was the recipient of an honorary degree from Boston University.
