Julia Roberts life and biography

Julia Roberts ( also known as: Julia Fiona Roberts, Julie Fiona Roberts, Julie Roberts, Julia Moder) born: Smyrna, Georgia, 28 October 1967; is an American Actress.

Julia is the sister of the actor Eric Roberts.

Family: Married Lyle Lovett, 1993 (divorced 1995); married Danny Moder, 2002. Children: Phinnaeus Walter and Hazel Patricia (from second marriage). Career: 1985--moved to New York; 1988--film debut with brother Eric in Blood Red; 1990--voted Performer of the Year by American cinema owners; 2003--earned a reported $25 million for Mona Lisa Smile, making her the highest paid female movie star.

Julia Roberts had her first big hit with Pretty Woman in 1990, and after a decade of serious ups and downs, regained stride, having an Oscar under her belt for Erin Brockovich and winning the People's Choice Award for Favorite Motion Picture Actress from 1999-2005. Making her film debut with her brother Eric in Blood Red, Roberts appeared in three more films before getting a substantial role among the all-star cast in Steel Magnolias. Not dimmed by the acting of film veterans such as Shirley MacLaine and Sally Field and no less striking in beauty than Daryl Hannah, Roberts delivers a powerful performance as a young and courageous Southern belle (Shelby) who strives for a wholesome life by becoming a mother despite her unfit physical condition. With her fiery red hair and what has now become a signature broad smile, Shelby represents a vitality that shines its brightest in the face of life's most fatal odds.

As a happy-go-lucky whore in Pretty Woman, Roberts captured the hearts of critics and public alike and was suddenly exposed to public attention on a grand scale. The story is no more than a modern version of Cinderella combined with a banal, "triumph of love over materialism" message. One of her next films, Sleeping with the Enemy, though another commercial success, taking $70 million within its first six weeks, was greeted by only mediocre reviews by the critics. Another moral tale celebrating traditional values and highlighting Roberts's image of youthful and wholesome vitality combined with vulnerability and sexual allure, this film secured Roberts's position as one of the leading stars of the 1990s.

With a rumored $10 million per movie in 1991, Roberts really seemed to look like the girl who had it all--looks, talent, success, and money. Such an early success, however, also seems to warrant the enormous pressure of coming to fame too quickly and too young. "As we begin talking, it's abundantly clear that Julia Roberts distrusts journalists," wrote Robert Palmer in 1990. This inherent tension with media would continue to worsen when reporters all over the world exploited her last-minute cancellation of her wedding to actor Kiefer Sutherland in 1991. Her sudden marriage to and subsequent divorce from singer Lyle Lovett proved to be equally sensational for the press.

Roberts is certainly not the first Hollywood star to find the pressure of fame overwhelming. Comparisons were quickly made with the likes of Marilyn Monroe and Elizabeth Taylor--sometimes with sympathy, and sometimes with not. Roberts and the ideals she has stood for seemed, if only temporarily, to have gone off the rails, bringing the fantasy of womanhood as enduring and magical innocence back down to earth with a bang. Consistently rising above her material, she continued to shine in formulaic escapism like Dying Young, a terminal illness weepie shot like a series of commercials promoting tasteful grief, and The Pelican Brief, a dark political thriller devoid of the requisite chills to the spine. Despite bad press and periods of inactivity that would have derailed less secure careers, Roberts remained Hollywood's golden girl.

Sporting the sort of toothpaste grin that Lorenz Hart once wrote about, she triumphed over jerry-built vehicles like I Love Trouble and Conspiracy Theory, two shapeless projects that didn't know whether they meant to be thrillers or comedies (and didn't care, as long as they turned a profit). One comprehended her decision to break out of her good sport mold for the intriguing misfire, Mary Reilly, based on an evocative minor novel about Dr. Jeckyll's maid. Like other charm gals before her, Roberts foolishly decided that stamping out her own personality was the best way to inhabit the mousey character. Instead of delineating the role of abused servant, Roberts seemed intimidated by the challenge, hamstrung by her British accent, and benumbed by the mystifying performance of John Malkovich, who exhibited too much avoirdupois for a role once tackled by matinee idols. A few years later, she would meet a dramatic challenge more forcefully in Stepmom, a soap opera sprinkled with equal parts comedy and expensive sentiment. Matching her acting partner, the more protean Susan Sarandon, Roberts fine tuned an arsenal of emotions as she found instant motherhood thrust upon her.

Comedy was her undisputed forte, however, and she transformed three frothy properties (My Best Friend's Wedding, Notting Hill, The Runaway Bride) into mega-hits, while burnishing the careers of her male co-stars with her own glow. What made these romantic comedies fascinating was that Roberts didn't shy away from lending these sketchy characters a touch of the emasculator. Unlike her earlier hit, Something to Talk About, in which she's a victim redressing wrongs, Roberts' recent roles comprised screwed-up screwballs, who harkened back to Claudette Colbert and her wicked teasing of Gary Cooper in Bluebeard's Eighth Wife. In My Best Friend's Wedding, her vacillating careerist tried to win back an ex-fiance as if he were a luxury item she coveted; in Notting Hill, her movie goddess wreaked havoc on a bookseller by expecting him to treat her as an ordinary gal-pal while exhibiting diva-like behavior; in The Runaway Bride she jilted grooms on a regular basis. Underlying Hollywood comedies' usual behavioral text (about the regrouping of mismatched lovers) was a subtext of willfulness that only Roberts could make palatable. In all these and in the true-life saga, Erin Brockovich, she was never less than radiant. As a comic force, she's less daffy than merely hard-headed. Like a modern-day Goldilocks, Roberts' screen persona fussily keeps searching for the bed that's just right.

In the expansive role of Erin Brockovich, Roberts illuminated the unflappable spirit of a hard-pressed working mom, whose flashy clothes cue the wrong responses from selfish men and jealous women. Watching this tailor-made vehicle, one could see why she became the first female to earn $20 million per picture. Unfazed by a venal power company, unimpressed by arrogant lawyers, and unapologetic about fulfilling herself through her work, her crusading character rode roughshod over anyone who stood in the way of justice. Although her character refused to kowtow to conventional notions of propriety, Roberts emerged as likeable as ever.

Balancing serious roles with crowd-pleasing farces, Roberts has chosen wisely, yet one senses untapped depths. A superb TV guest spot as a villainess on Law and Order showcased the self-absorbed side of her personality. She remains Hollywood's most bankable female star; in 2000, Forbes magazine listed her as the most powerful woman in show business.

Roberts kept her female fan base happy in 2003 with Mona Lisa Smile. The movie, set in the 1950s, showcases Roberts as Katherine Ann Watson, an unorthodox professor teaching at the highly conservative Wellesley College. As a free-thinking Berkeley grad, Roberts's character tries to open the eyes of her students and get them to question the traditional roles society had relegated women of that time period. The movie proved to be a heart-wrenching tale revolving around women's educational opportunities in the 1950s. Roberts was ever-radiant in her role, and the film became a hit among female viewers. Roberts was paid an unprecedented $25 million for the film, making her Hollywood's top paid film actress.

In 2004, Roberts rewarded fans with Ocean's Twelve, a sequel to her 2001 blockbuster Ocean's Eleven, which was a remake of a 1960s action movie. In the films, Roberts stars as Tess Ocean, ex-wife to the smooth-talking con artist Danny Ocean, played by George Clooney. The plots in both films revolve around Clooney's character trying to win back the affection of Roberts's character through over-the-top schemes and heists. With a star-driven cast, including Brad Pitt and Catherine Zeta-Jones, Ocean's Twelve debuted in December 2004 raking in $40.9 million its first weekend at the box office.

Grand Rapids Press movie critic Nick Van Eck said Ocean's Twelve was one of the best sequels ever made. He called the acting "extremely realistic" and said that "every explosion shook me in my seat, and I felt every happy moment, sad moment or completely action-packed moment as if it were my own life. Julia Roberts was a major contribution to the film, pretending to be herself." Indeed, Roberts caught the attention of the movie-watching world and was rewarded with a 2005 People's Choice Award for Favorite Motion Picture Actress. She has won the award every year since 1999.

In November of 2004, Roberts gave birth to twins, Phinnaeus Walter and Hazel Patricia. The children are from her marriage to cameraman Danny Moder, whom Roberts met while filming The Mexican. She backed away from her film career for a while to care for her children, but got her feet wet again (and gratis) in a rock video for her friend Dave Matthews in the spring of 2005. She had some paying jobs lined up for 2005 as well, including lending her voice to Ant Bully and Charlotte's Web. In Ant Bully, based on a John Nickle book, Roberts was the voice of an ant called Hova in the film that revolves around a boy who destroys an ant colony with his squirt gun, only to find himself shrunk to ant size and forced to help rebuild the ruins. Charlotte's Web. involved a pig that befriends a spider to avoid a fate on the dinner table.

She made her Broadway debut with Three Days of Rain, directed by Joe Mantello, in March of 2006. Her marquee name made the play a hard ticket, though critics were less embracing. But Ben Brantley of the New York Times wrote: "That she does not do well -- at least not by any conventional standards of theatrical art--is unlikely to lose Ms. Roberts any fans, though it definitely won't win her any new ones among drama snobs. "

Roberts late in 2006 also began filming for Charlie Wilson's War, a drama based on a Texas congressman's covert dealings in Afghanistan. She also planned to star in The Friday Night Knitting Club, scheduled for release in 2008. It is based on a Kathleen Jacobs novel by that name.

WORKS
* Films as Actress

* 1988: Blood Red (Masterson--produced in 1986) (as Maria Collogero)
* 1988: Satisfaction (Girls of Summer) (Freeman) (as Daryle Shane)
* 1988: Baja Oklahoma (Roth--for TV)
* 1988: Mystic Pizza (Petrie) (as Daisy Arujo)
* 1989: Steel Magnolias (Ross) (as Shelby Eatenton Latcherie)
* 1990: Pretty Woman (Garry Marshall) (as Vivian Ward)
* 1990: Flatliners (Schumacher) (as Rachel Mannus)
* 1991: Dying Young (Schumacher) (as Hillary O'Neil)
* 1991: Hook (Spielberg) (as Tinkerbell)
* 1991: Sleeping with the Enemy (Ruben) (as Sara Waters/Laura Burney)
* 1992: The Player (Altman) (cameo)
* 1993: The Pelican Brief (Pakula) (as Darby Shaw)
* 1994: I Love Trouble (Shyer) (as Sabrina Peterson)
* 1994: Ready to Wear (Prêt-à-Porter) (Altman) (as Anne Eisenhower)
* 1995: Something to Talk About (Hallstrom) (as Grace)
* 1996: Mary Reilly (Frears) (title role)
* 1996: Michael Collins (Neil Jordan) (as Kitty Kiernan)
* 1996: Everyone Says I Love You (Allen) (as Vonnie "Von" Seidel)
* 1997: My Best Friend's Wedding (Hogan) (as Julianne "Jules" Potter)
* 1997: Conspiracy Theory (Donner) (as Alice Sutton)
* 1998: In the Wild (Cole--for TV) (as herself)
* 1998: Stepmom (Columbus) (as Isabel Kelly)
* 1999: Notting Hill (Michell) (as Anna Scott)
* 1999: Runaway Bride (Marshall) (as Maggie Carpenter)
* 2000: Erin Brockovich (Soderbergh) (title role)
* 2001: The Mexican(Verbinski) (as Samantha Barzel).
* 2001: Ocean's Eleven (Soderbergh) (as Tess Ocean).
* 2001: America's Sweethearts (Roth) (as Kiki Harrison).
* 2002: Grand Champion (Tubb) (as Julia).
* 2002: Full Frontal (Soderbergh) (as Catherine/Francesca).
* 2002: Confessions of a Dangerous Mind (Clooney/Soderbergh) (as Patricia Watson).
* 2003: Mona Lisa Smile (Newell) (as Katherine Ann Watson).
* 2004: Ocean's Twelve (Soderbergh) (as Tess Ocean).
* 2004: Closer (Nichols) (as Anna).
* 2007: Charlie Wilson’s War (filming) (Nichols) (as Joanne Herring).
* 2007: The Friday Night Knitting Club (announced) (as Georgia Walker).
*2007: Charlie Wilson's War
*2008: Fireflies in the Garden
*2009: Duplicity
*2010: Valentine's Day
*2010:Eat, Pray, Love
*2011: Larry Crowne
Book
* Sanello, Frank, Julia Roberts, London, 2000.

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