Julie Kavner

At 74 years old, Julie Kavner physical status not available right now. We will update Julie Kavner's height, weight, eye color, hair color, build, and measurements.

Julie Deborah Kavner (born September 7, 1950) is an American actress.

She first attracted notice for her role as Brenda Morgenstern, the younger sister of Valerie Harper's title character in the sitcom Rhoda, for which she won a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series.

She is best known for her voice role as Marge Simpson on the animated television series The Simpsons.

She also voices other characters for the show, including Marge's mother, Jacqueline Bouvier, and sisters Patty and Selma Bouvier. Known for her improvisation and distinctive "honeyed gravel voice", Kavner was cast in her first professional acting role as Brenda Morgenstern in Rhoda in 1974.

She received four Primetime Emmy Award nominations for playing the character, winning the award in 1978, the year that the series ended.

Starting in 1987, Kavner started appearing on The Tracey Ullman Show.

The Tracey Ullman Show included a series of animated shorts about a dysfunctional family.

Voices were needed for the shorts, and the producers asked Kavner to voice Marge.

The shorts were spun off into The Simpsons. Kavner has been described as "nearly reclusive"; part of her contract says that she will never have to promote The Simpsons on video.

For her work as Marge, Kavner received another Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Voice-Over Performance in 1992 and an Annie Award nomination for her performance as the character in The Simpsons Movie. Typically cast as a "woman who is supportive, sympathetic or self-effacingly funny", Kavner grew to dislike playing such roles.

In 1992, she starred in This Is My Life, her first leading role in a feature film.

Kavner has also appeared in live-action roles in six films written by Woody Allen and in the Adam Sandler comedy Click.

Early life

Kavner was born in Los Angeles, California, on September 7, 1950, the second daughter of Rose, a family counselor, and David Kavner, a furniture manufacturer, and grew up in Southern California. She decided to pursue a career in acting because "There was nothing else I wanted to do, ever". She attended Beverly Hills High School (which she later admitted she hated), where she was "something of a loner", and unsuccessfully tried out for several plays. John Ingle, formerly the chairman of the Beverly Hills High School art department, later commented that Kavner was "excellent at improvisation, but she wasn't an ingenue and not that castable at that age".

After graduating from high school, Kavner attended San Diego State University and majored in drama, being cast in several productions including a role as Charlotte Corday in Marat/Sade, becoming known for her improvisation and ability to do both comedy and drama. After graduating in 1971, she got a day job as a typist at the UCLA School of the Arts and Architecture.

Personal life

Kavner is Jewish. She was born and raised in Southern California, but by 1992 had taken up residence in Manhattan, New York. Kavner leads a private, "nearly reclusive" life, "discreet and guarded beyond the usual reticent star routine". She rarely makes public appearances and refuses to be photographed at work, especially in the studio while doing The Simpsons. Her partner is retired producer David Davis; they have lived together since 1976. In 1983, it was reported in Current Biography that Kavner is an avid athlete and a pescetarian.

In a 1992 interview with The New York Times, Kavner said she was considering retiring, "except for doing three days a year for Woody [Allen]", but felt that if she did retire, she would receive a script she wanted "to do more than life itself".

Source

Career

In 1973, Kavner auditioned for a role as one of Rhoda Morgenstern's sisters in The Mary Tyler Moore Exhibition. David Davis, the show's producer, had persuaded her to audition for the role but she ultimately decided to cast another actress. Rhoda Morgenstern, a year ago, became the leading character in a spin-off called Rhoda. Brenda Morgenstern, the sister of the eponymous character, was cast in her first professional acting role. From September 9, 1974 to 1978, Rhoda appeared on CBS from September 9, 1974 to December 1978. Brenda was nominated for Outstanding Continuing Actress in a Comedy Series for playing Brenda, winning in 1978. She has also been recognized for four Golden Globe Awards. She received a Daytime Emmy Award nomination for her role in the daytime movie "You Can't Lose."

Following Rhoda's appearance on Taxi, Kavner appeared in both 1985 and 1987's Surrender, both of which were box office flops. She appeared in the television series Revenge of the Stepford Wives, No Other Love, and A Fine Romance, as well as shooting a television pilot. She appeared in many stage performances, including a play called It Had to Be You at a dinner theater in Toronto, directed by Burt Reynolds, and two for the Seesaw. Woody Allen first saw Kavner in the 1970s while watching Rhoda. He thought she was remarkable and then offered her a role in his 1986 film Hannah and Her Sisters. Allen and the film helped her resurrect her career, according to Kavner.

In The Tracey Ullman Exhibition, which debuted on Fox in 1987, Kavner was cast as a sidekick to Tracey Ullman. "Like being back in school, a chance to play a large number of characters, some very cruel people," Kavner said, "not to restrain on laurels, but not to play it safe." "What I do is not mimicry or an impersonation," Kavner said, but more of an assimilation." [On The Tracey Ullman Exhibition] We did a lot of research to find out who to base our characters on. "We did our homework at our lunch break." She was nominated for Best Individual Achievement in a Variety or Music Program by the Primetime Emmy Award.

Marge Simpson on the animated television show The Simpsons was one of the most well-known comedians of the day, and Kavner was best known for her role as Marge Simpson on the animated television series The Simpsons, which continues to be popular today. A series of animated shorts about the dysfunctional Simpson family was on display at the Tracey Ullman Exhibition. The producers decided to ask Kavner and fellow cast member Dan Castellaneta to perform Marge and Homer rather than recruiting more actors. Kavner has been described as a "honed gravel voice" by Hilary de Vries of The New York Times. "A bump on [her] vocal cords," Kavner says, "today's voice has been attributed to [her] vocal cords." Marge's voice has swept into older years as Kavner has aged, and Marge's voice in the early seasons had to be changed as it began to strain Kavner's voice.

Marge is the show's highest celebrity celebrity, but Kavner's favorite characters to voice are Marge and Selma Bouvier because "they're both funny and sad at the same time." Matt Groening, a series creator, told Kavner that the two characters would "suck the hell out of everything." Both have similar raspy voices, but Patty's voice is more masculine and has a lower register, while Selma's voice is a bit sweeter. Kavner also performed the voices of every other female Bouvier family, including Marge's mother Jacqueline, Great-Aunt Gladys (a deceased relative who was on season four's "Molly's Choice"), and an unidentified grandmother seen on the season six episode "Fear of Flying."

Despite the fact that cast members and crew have referred to Kavner as a passionate fan of the series and the characters she portrays, Kavner's deal guarantees that she will never have to promote The Simpsons on television nor has she performed Marge's in public, although she claims that the publicity "destroys the myth." These are people who are authentic.' Kavner is seriously considering recording sessions, and argues that voice acting is "a little more limited than live performance." "I have nothing to do with my character's development." In her book My Life as a 10-Year-Old Boy, Nancy Cartwright said that Kavner, as "an actor" with "extraordinary dedication and a quiet work ethic, is a warm person" with "extraordinary dedication and a warm attitude, and that she is seldom late for recording sessions. Kavner has only one recorded interview about her time on the show from 1992, describing Marge as "a wonderful person" with "a wonderful sex life."

Kavner was paid $30,000 per episode before 1998. Fox threatened to replace the six main voice actors with new actors during a pay dispute in 1998, going as far as promising to cast new voices. However, the conflict was quickly settled and she was paid $125,000 per episode until 2004, when the voice actors demanded that they be paid $360,000 an episode. A month later, the problem was resolved, and Kavner earned $250,000 per episode. The voice actors received over $400,000 per episode after salary re-negotiations in 2008. Kavner and the other cast members accepted a 30 percent salary cut, down to less than $300,000 per episode three years later, with Fox threatening to cancel the series if production costs were reduced.

Kavner received a Primetime Emmy Award for his role as Marge in the season three episode "I Married Marge." Kavner and Dan Castellaneta received the Young Artist Award for Most Popular Mom & Dad in a television Series in 2004. Kavner was nominated for Best Voice Acting in an Animated Film at the 2007 Annie Awards, but Ratatouille's Ian Holm was nominated for Best Voice Acting in an Animated Feature. Kavner's emotional appearance in the film received praise, and one analyst said she "gave what must be the most touching performance ever to find its way into a film based on an irreverent cartoon." Some scenes in the film, including Marge's emotional video greeting to Homer, were shot over 100 times, leaving Kavner drained.

Hilary de Vries, a New York Times writer, has characterized many of Kavner's roles as "woman who is generous, sympathetic, or self-effacingly humourous." "It smacks of Brenda Morgenstern, I will not work the job," Kavner began to loase playing such roles. Eleanor Costello, a nurse who befriends Robin Williams' character in the Academy Award nominated film Awakenings, appeared in a supporting role. Kavner talked to several nurses in preparation for the role, and director Penny Marshall described Kavner as "a low-maintenance actor" [[you] never have to be concerned with giving [her] back-story for her characters." Kavner starred in This Is My Life, her first leading role in a feature film in 1992. When her debutant career began, Kavner played Dottie Ingels, an up-and-coming stand-up comedian who starts neglecting her family. Dottie was described as "completely selfish," but Kavner later admitted, "I like the position for the very reason." Kavner had been asked to perform a smaller role in the film, but Joe Roth, the film's chairman at the time, suggested that they cast a lesser well known actress in the lead role. Kavner "has so little vanity that it is almost shocking," Nora Ephron, the author of This Is My Life. Not only does she have no calls as an actress, but what's in my refrigerator?' But she will do something for the story if it makes sense to her."

Kavner has appeared in Woody Allen films, including appearances in Hannah and Her Sisters (1986), Radio Days (1989), Alice (1991), and Deconstructing Harry (1997). Allen characterized her as "a naturally funny person." You listen to her and look at her when she does a scene, and the prism through which it's all filtered is funny." "Anything [Allen] does, I'm a true filmmaker" and one that's got something to say, continuously exploring different aspects of his own film-making," Kavner says, "I don't even have to read it."

She has worked in films such as The Lion King 1112, Dr. Dolittle, and an uncredited appearance as an announcer in A Walk on the Moon. In Click, she was cast as the mother of Adam Sandler's character, which was released in 2006. Tracey Ullman appeared in the HBO sketch comedy film Tracey Takes On...

Source