Jena Malone life and biography

Jena Malone is an American actress and musician who has appeared on television, in films, and on Broadway. She made her movie debut with the film Bastard Out of Carolina (1996), and has appeared in films including Contact (1997), Stepmom (1998), Donnie Darko (2001), Saved! (2004), Into the Wild (2007), and Sucker Punch (2011).

Beginning as a child actress, and now stepping up to roles as a young adult, Malone's career path has been compared to that of Jodie Foster, herself a former child actress and who has co-starred with Malone in two movies. Jena is often described as having a maturity beyond her years and, in her career thus far, she has often tackled roles that are difficult and are not standard fare for actors her age.

Malone's first claim to fame was in performing the title role in Bastard Out of Carolina (1996) for which she won the Young Artist Award, and which she filmed when she was merely ten years old. This movie dealt with issues of child abuse, violence and sex. Jena has said in later interviews that this movie and her participation in it continue to influence her life substantially.

Showing self-assurance and a clear vision of personal goals from an early age, Jena, at age 14, was encouraged to try out for Air Force One (1997), a movie that was virtually guaranteed to be a success since box-office king Harrison Ford was cast in the lead, but Jena said she'd prefer to seek other roles that were of more interest to her.

In the following years, Malone appeared in several made-for-TV movies for which she won or was nominated for many awards. In 1997, she lucked in to being cast in the blockbuster Contact (1997) where she portrayed the child version of Jodie Foster's lead character. Foster stated that she built her character by mimicking Jena. And, in 1998, Jena was cast in the major film Stepmom (1998) where she co-starred with Julia Roberts, Susan Sarandon and Ed Harris. Jena was given what was likely the best line in that movie where her character, bitter over her parents' divorce, confronts her father who has returned home briefly; at a moment of crisis, her dad tells her "You do NOT run out on your mother", and the rueful Malone exclaims "No -- that's YOUR job".

Also, in 1998, Malone appeared in a two-part episode of the critically acclaimed TV series "Homicide: Life on the Street" (1993). Contrary to what might usually be expected of a teenage actress, in this episode, Jena played the complex role of the perpetrator of a crime, which she portrayed with subtlety.

Malone is also an experimental musician who has released music both under her own name and as "The Shoe".

Malone had lived in 27 locations by the age of nine, including Lake Tahoe, California. She was raised by her mother, Deborah, and her mother's girlfriend, whom she calls "Godmom," and began taking an interest in acting after watching her mother, who was involved in community theatre. She briefly moved to Las Vegas, hated it, and persuaded her mother to move on to Los Angeles. Malone was home-schooled from sixth to eighth grade. She attended the Professional Children's School, for the ninth grade, in New York, and quit it after a year, when she became legally emancipated, in January 2000. At some point she later obtained her General Educational Development (GED).

Filmography:

2011: The Wait
2011: Sucker Punch

Awards:

1996: Young Artist Award Best Performance in a TV Movie/Mini-Series - Young Actress
1998: Saturn Award Best Performance by a Younger Actor/Actress
Young Artist Award Best Performance in a TV Movie/Pilot/Mini-Series - Leading Young Actress
1999: Young Artist Award Best Performance in a Feature Film - Leading Young Actress
YoungStar Award Best Performance by a Young Actress in a Drama Film
2001: DVD Exclusive Awards Best Supporting Actress
2004: Sonoma Valley Film Festival Imagery Honors

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