Spanish postcard in the Colección Estrellas Cinematográficas by Cacitel, no. 30, 1990.
Michelle Pfeiffer in
Scarface (Brian De Palma, 1983).
American actress and producer
Michelle Pfeiffer (1958) was one of the most popular and talented Hollywood actresses of the 1980s and 1990s. Noted for her versatility as a character actress, Pfeiffer has become particularly known for portraying nuanced and unglamorous, emotionally distant women as well as strong female characters with intense sex appeal.
Michelle Marie Pfeiffer was born in 1958 in Santa Ana, California, to Donna Jean (Taverna) and Richard Pfeiffer, a heating and air-conditioning contractor. Pfeiffer graduated from Fountain Valley High School in 1976 and attended Golden West College for one year, where she studied to become a court reporter. But it was while working as a supermarket checker at Vons, a large Southern California grocery chain, that she realized her true calling. She began to pursue an acting career in 1978. After accepting several minor roles in television series and films, her first leading role was in the musical film Grease 2 (Patricia Birch, 1982) opposite Maxwell Caulfield. It was the sequel to the popular hit film Grease (Randal Kleiser, 1978) and takes place two years after the original film at Rydell High School, set in the 1961–1962 school year. Although the film was poorly received, it increased public interest in Pfeiffer. Frustrated with being typecast as the token pretty girl, Pfeiffer actively pursued more serious material. She received strong reviews for her breakout performance as gangster moll Elvira Hancock in the crime film Scarface (Brian De Palma, 1983) opposite Al Pacino. Her performance as one-third of the titular trio - with Cher and Susan Sarandon - in the dark fantasy The Witches of Eastwick (George Miller, 1987) proved to be one of her first box office successes. Pfeiffer's starring role in Married to the Mob (Jonathan Demme, 1988), in which she was cast against type as a mobster's widow, earned the actress her first of several consecutive Golden Globe Award nominations. Her role in Dangerous Liaisons (Stephen Frears, 1988) based on Christopher Hampton's play Les liaisons dangereuses, garnered her an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress. Then followed her sultry performance as lounge singer Susie Diamond in The Fabulous Baker Boys (Steve Kloves, 1989) with Jeff and Beau Bridges. Susie would be the most critically acclaimed role of her career and she got another Academy Award nomination, now for Best Actress.
Michelle Pfeiffer starred opposite Al Pacino as the titular waitress in the romantic comedy Frankie and Johnny (Garry Marshall, 1991). She achieved widespread recognition as Catwoman / Selina Kyle in Tim Burton's superhero film Batman Returns (1992). Pfeiffer's interpretation is widely regarded as one of the most definitive portrayals of the comic book character. She earned a third Academy Award nomination for Love Field (Jonathan Kaplan, 1992) before starring in the critically acclaimed The Age of Innocence (Martin Scorsese, 1993) with Daniel Day-Lewis. It was followed by the romantic horror film Wolf (Mike Nichols, 1994) with Jack Nicholson, the supernatural horror film What Lies Beneath (Robert Zemeckis, 2000) with Harrison Ford, and White Oleander (Peter Kosminsky, 2002). During this time, she also produced a series of films under her production company Via Rosa Productions. After a five-year hiatus from film acting, she appeared in Hairspray (Adam Shankman, 2007), Chéri (Stephen Frears, 2009), and Dark Shadows (Tim Burton, 2012). She received her first Emmy Award nomination for portraying Ruth Madoff in the HBO television film The Wizard of Lies (Barry Levinson, 2017), and garnered further critical acclaim for her role in Where Is Kyra? (Andrew Dosunmu, 2017) with Kiefer Sutherland. Michelle Pfeiffer then appeared in the ensemble film Murder on the Orient Express (Kenneth Branagh, 2017). Pfeiffer debuted in the Marvel Cinematic Universe as Janet van Dyne, the original Wasp, in the Ant-Man (2015) sequel Ant-Man and the Wasp (Peyton Reed, 2018) starring Paul Rudd. She reprised the role in Avengers: Endgame Ant-Man and the Wasp (Anthony Russo, Joe Russo, 2019) and Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania (Peyton Reed, 2023). Pfeiffer was praised for her role as Betty Ford in the TV series The First Lady (Susanne Bier, 2022). Michelle Pfeiffer was married to actor/director Peter Horton in 1981. They later divorced, and she then had a three-year relationship with actor Fisher Stevens. When that did not work out, Pfeiffer decided she did not want to wait any longer before having her own family, and in March 1993, she adopted a baby girl, Claudia Rose. Later the same year, she married lawyer-turned-writer/producer David E. Kelley. In 1994, their son John Henry was born.
Sources: Wikipedia and IMDb.
And please check out our blog European Film Star Postcards. 