Joan Cusack Biography (2)

Joan Cusack has received two Academy Award nominations, one for her comic portrayal of a Staten Island secretary in Working Girl with Harrison Ford and Melanie Griffith, and one for her role as Kevin Kline's jilted bride in the critically acclaimed In & Out.

Her comic versatility has been displayed in her recent television series What About Joan for ABC. Among Cusack's other film credits are School of Rock, Arlington Road, Cradle Will Rock, Runaway Bride, High Fidelity, and Where The Heart Is, Grosse Pointe Blank, A Smile Like Yours, Broadcast News, Say Anything, Married to the Mob, and Sixteen Candles, among others. She will soon appear in Touchstone Pictures' The Last Shot.

The versatile actress made her screen debut in Tony Bill's My Bodyguard. She studied acting at the Piven Theatre Workshop in Evanston, Illinois where she grew up. While at the University of Wisconsin in Madison, she appeared with The Ark, an improv group. She graduated with a degree in English.

Cusack's theatre work includes the premiere of Cymbeline at the Joseph Papp Public Theatre in New York. She was Helena in A Midsummer Night's Dream at the Goodman Theatre in Chicago, and was directed by Joanne Akalitis in ‘Tis Pity She's a Whore. She was a regular on Saturday Night Live during the show's 1985-86 season, and appeared with Anne Bancroft in the BBC production of Paddy Chayefsky's The Mother. Joan lives in Chicago with her husband and children.

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