Piper Laurie

At 92 years old, Piper Laurie has this physical status:

Piper Laurie (born Rosetta Jacobs; January 22, 1932) is an American stage and screen actress known for her appearances in The Hustler (1961), Carrie (1976), and Children of a Lesser God (1986), two of which earned her Academy Award nominations.

She is also known for her appearances in Days of Wine and Roses, as Kirsten Arnesen, and as Catherine Martell in the cult television series Twin Peaks, for which she received a Golden Globe Award in 1991.

She appeared in the film White Boy Rick in 2018.

Early life

Piper Laurie was born in Detroit, Michigan, the younger of two children (both girls) of Alfred Jacobs, a furniture dealer, and his wife, Charlotte Sadie (née Alperin) Jacobs. Her paternal grandparents were Jewish immigrants from Poland, and her maternal grandparents were Jewish immigrants from Russia.

She was born in a one-bedroom walk-up on Tyler Street in Detroit, where the family lived, according to her 2011 autobiography Learning to Live Out Loud. In 1938, Alfred Jacobs moved the family to Los Angeles, California, where she attended Hebrew school. Her parents gave her weekly elocution lessons to combat her shyness; this eventually led to minor roles at nearby Universal Studios.

Laurie's mother and grandmother placed Laurie's older sister in a sanitarium for her asthma. Laurie was told to continue working with her company.

Personal life

Laurie was married to Wall Street Journal entertainment writer Joe Morgenstern in New York. They met shortly after the film's premiere in 1961, when Morgenstern interviewed her during the film's promotion. They started dating soon, and nine months after the interview, they were married on January 21, 1962. She and Morgenstern migrated to Woodstock, New York, New York, when no prominent roles appeared after The Hustler. Anne Grace Morgenstern, a child from 1971, was adopted by them. The couple divorced in 1982, after which she moved to Hollywood and began working in film and television. She had previously dated actor and potential US president Ronald Reagan.

She was named "Obesity of the Year" in 1962, and in 2000, she was in Korea for her service during the Korean War. She appeared at the Mid-Atlantic Nostalgia Convention in Hunt Valley, Maryland, in September 2014.

Laurie is a ceramic sculptor who works in marble and clay, and she shows her work on display.

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Career

Rosetta Jacobs completed a deal with Universal Studios in 1949, renaming Piper Laurie, which she has used since then. Julia Best, Julie Adams, Tony Curtis, and Rock Hudson were among the actresses she encountered at Universal. She appeared in Louisa with Ronald Reagan, who she met a few times before his marriage to Nancy Davis. She argued that she lost her virginity to him in her autobiography. Several other roles followed Francis Goes to the Races (1951, co-starring Donald O'Connor); Son of Ali Baba (1951, co-starring Tony Curtis); and Ain't Misbehavin' (1955, co-starring Rory Calhoun)

Laurie bathed in milk and ate flower petals to protect her radiant skin, according to gossip columnists. Disappointed by a lack of strong film roles, she returned to New York City to study acting and television production. In Days of Wine and Roses with Cliff Robertson, produced by Playhouse 90 in 1958, she appeared in Twelfth Night, which was part of a production by Playhouse 90; in Days of Wine and Roses with Jack Lemmon and Lee Remick); and in Winterset, which was shown by Playhouse 90 in 1959.

She was lured back to Hollywood by the offer to co-star with Paul Newman in The Hustler, which was released in 1961. Sarah Packard, Sarah Packard's sister, received an Academy Award nomination for Best Actress for her role. Since The Hustler, actresses are unlikely to return, so she and her partner travelled to New York. She appeared in two medical dramas in 1964, as Alicia Carter in "My Door Is Locked and Bolted" and as Alice Marin in the Breaking Point episode "The Summer House." She appeared in a Broadway revival of Tennessee Williams' The Glass Menagerie in 1965, opposite Maule, Pat Hingle, and George Grizzard.

Laurie did not appear in another film until she accepted Margaret White's role in the horror film Carrie (1976). She received an Academy Award for her role as the actress's contribution to the film, as well as the commercial success of the film, relaunched her career. Sissy Spacek, her co-star, praised her acting ability: "She is a marvelous actress." She never does what you want her to do -- she never disappoints you with her approach to a scene.

In 1979, she appeared in the Australian film Tim opposite Mel Gibson as Mary Horton. Laurie moved to California after her 1981 divorce. Mrs. Norman in Children of a Lesser God (1986), she received her third Oscar nomination for her role. She was given an Emmy for her role in Promise, a television film starring James Garner and James Woods. She appeared in The Destiny of Me off-Broadway in 1992 and 1999, and Julie Hagerty, Buck Henry, Frances Sternhagen, and Estelle Parsons appeared in Paul Osborn's The Destiny of Me.

In 1990–1991, she appeared in David Lynch's television series Twin Peaks as the devious Catherine Martell. She appeared in Other People's Money (1991), as well as in horror maestro Dario Argento's first American film Trauma (1993). On ER, she played George Clooney's mother. She appeared in Patty Duke's film A Christmas Memory in 1997, and in 1998, she appeared in The Faculty, a sci-fi thriller. She appeared on television shows including Frasier, Matlock, State of Grace, and Will & Grace. Laurie appeared in Cold Case and in a 2001 episode of Law & Order's "Care," in which she played an adoptive mother and foster grandmother who murdered one of the foster grandchildren in her daughter's custody and abused her adoptedive son and foster grandchildren.

Toni Collette, the opposite actress of Eulogy (2004) and The Dead Girl (2006), returned to the big screen for independent films. Rainn Wilson's mother appeared in Hesher in 2010 and in 2018, she appeared in White Boy Rick as the grandmother of the title character.

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