Actor / Director Profile

Rebecca De Mornay was born in 1959. Her parents divorced when she was young, and she got her last name when her mother married Richard De Mornay, who adopted her. After Richard's untimely death, Rebecca's mother moved her and her half-brother Peter from northern California to Europe, where she was raised primarily in England and Austria. Rebecca graduated "summa cum laude" from a German-speaking high school in the Austrian alps, and still speaks fluent German and French.She began her acting training in Los Angeles at Lee Strasberg's Institute, became an apprentice at Francis Ford Coppola's Zoetrope Film Studio, and soon thereafter made her film debut in One from the Heart (1982), which was followed by the box office hit Risky Business (1983), in which she gave a seductive and critically acclaimed performance as a streetwise prostitute. She went on to international stardom with her portrayal of a chillingly twisted nanny in the hugely popular The Hand That Rocks the Cradle (1992). Other acclaimed film work includes Runaway Train (1985) (with Jon Voight), The Trip to Bountiful (1985) (with Geraldine Page), Backdraft (1991) (with Kurt Russell).Network television work includes the tour-de-force role of Arlie in the stellar Getting Out (1994) (TV) (based on Marsha Norman's play), the tragic title character in Dominick Dunne's An Inconvenient Woman (1991) (TV) (with Jason Robards), the remake of "The Shining" (1997) (produced by Stephen King), a multi-episode story arc about a cancer survivor on "ER" (1994) and Hallmark Hall of Fame's Night Ride Home (1999) (TV) (with Ellen Burstyn).On stage, she starred as Billie Dawn in "Born Yesterday" (1988) at the Pasadena Playhouse, as Charlotte Corday in "Marat/Sade" (1990) at the Williamstown Festival, and as Anna in "Closer" (2000) at the Mark Taper Forum.Rebecca's directing debut was with a segment of Showtime's "The Outer Limits" (1995) starring John Savage and Frank Whaley. Twice divorced from writer Bruce Wagner and, more recently, sportscaster Patrick O'Neal, Rebecca resides in Los Angeles with her two young daughters Sophia and Veronica.