Mary Steenburgen

Mary Nell Steenburgen (born February 8, 1953) is an American actress, comedian, singer, and songwriter.

Steenburgen was born February 8, 1953, in Newport, Arkansas, to Nellie Mae (née Wall), a school-board secretary, and Maurice Hoffman Steenburgen, a freight-train conductor who worked for the Missouri Pacific Railroad.

She has a sister, Nancy Kelly (née Steenburgen), a teacher.

After studying at New York's Neighborhood Playhouse in the 1970s, she made her professional acting debut in the Western comedy film Goin' South (1978).

In 1971, she enrolled at Hendrix College to study drama.

She subsequently traveled to Dallas at the suggestion of her drama teacher where she successfully auditioned for New York City's Neighborhood Playhouse School of the Theatre.

Steenburgen moved to Manhattan in 1972 after the Neighborhood Playhouse offered her an opportunity to study acting.

She worked as a server at The Magic Pan and for Doubleday while studying under William Esper.

Steenburgen's break came when she was discovered by Jack Nicholson in the reception room of Paramount Pictures's New York office and was cast as the female lead in his second directorial work, the Western comedy Goin' South (1978).

Steenburgen went on to earn critical acclaim for her role in Time After Time (1979) and Jonathan Demme's comedy-drama film Melvin and Howard (1980), for which she received the Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actress – Motion Picture and the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress.

Steenburgen had a leading role in the film Time After Time (1979), for which she won the Saturn Award for Best Actress.

She played a modern woman who falls in love with author H. G. Wells, played by Malcolm McDowell, whom she married the following year.

In her third film, she won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for the film Melvin and Howard (1980).

She played Lynda Dummar, the wife of Melvin Dummar, a trucker and aspiring singer who claimed to have befriended reclusive eccentric Howard Hughes.

Steenburgen received a Golden Globe Award nomination for Miloš Forman's drama film Ragtime (1981).

Her other films include A Midsummer Night's Sex Comedy (1982), Cross Creek (1983), Back to the Future Part III (1990), What's Eating Gilbert Grape (1993), Philadelphia (1993), Nixon (1995), The Brave One (2007), Last Vegas (2013), A Walk in the Woods (2015), Book Club (2018), Nightmare Alley (2021), and Book Club: The Next Chapter (2023).

Another notable film appearance came in the well-received film Cross Creek (1983), in which she portrayed Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings, author of The Yearling.

She received nominations for a BAFTA TV Award for the miniseries Tender Is the Night (1985) and a Primetime Emmy Award for the television film The Attic: The Hiding of Anne Frank (1988).

Steenburgen has worked as a singer-songwriter for numerous films, in some of which she starred.

In 1985, she starred in the film One Magic Christmas as someone who falls on devastating times at Christmas, only to rely on a miracle to save her family.

She also became known for playing mothers in a string of comedy films such as Parenthood (1989), Elf (2003), Step Brothers (2008), Four Christmases (2008), The Proposal (2009), Did You Hear About the Morgans? (2009), The Help (2011), and Happiest Season (2020).

In 1989, she played Karen Buckman in Parenthood.

In Back to the Future Part III (1990), Steenburgen played Clara Clayton, a schoolteacher who falls in love with Doc Brown.

She was persuaded to play the role by her children, as well as by fans of the Back to the Future films, and reprised the role by providing the character's voice in Back to the Future: The Animated Series.

Other performances have been in What's Eating Gilbert Grape (1993), as a woman who is having an affair with the title character; My Summer Story (1994), as the mother of Ralphie Parker (the sequel to A Christmas Story); the role of Hannah Milhous Nixon in the Oliver Stone biopic Nixon (1995); and the Will Ferrell comedy Elf (2003), as a woman who discovers that her husband is the father of one of Santa's elves.

In television, Steenburgen appeared as Kate Montgomery in Ink (1996) and co-starred as Mary Gulliver in Gulliver's Travels (1996).

She has a recurring role as herself in Curb Your Enthusiasm.

Steenburgen co-starred as Helen Girardi, the mother of Amber Tamblyn's title character in Joan of Arcadia.

She has appeared in the comedy films Step Brothers (2008), playing the mother of Will Ferrell's character; Four Christmases (2008); and The Proposal (2009).

Dirty Girl, which featured Steenburgen, premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival on September 12, 2010.

She also appeared in the critically acclaimed film The Help (2011) and had a featured role as a lounge singer, who is the romantic interest in a love triangle, in the comedy film Last Vegas (2013).

She had a small role in the comedy-drama film A Walk in the Woods as Jeannie.

In 2011, she had a recurring role as Josephine in the HBO sitcom Bored to Death.

Steenburgen starred as Anastasia Lee in the 2011 FX pilot Outlaw Country, but it was passed by the network.

She appeared in the dark sitcom Wilfred from 2011 through 2013 as Catherine Newman, the title character's eccentric and mentally ill mother.

Steenburgen had a recurring role on the NBC sitcom 30 Rock from 2012 to 2013 where she played Diana Jessup.

In 2014, she began a recurring role as former Dixie Mafia boss Katherine Hale in the fifth and sixth seasons of Justified.

From 2015 to 2018, she starred as Gail Klosterman on the comedy series The Last Man on Earth.

For her song "Glasgow (No Place Like Home)", written for the musical film Wild Rose (2018), she received the Critics' Choice Movie Award for Best Song.

In 2018, Steenburgen starred with Diane Keaton, Jane Fonda and Candice Bergen in the romantic comedy film Book Club.