Stockard Channing

STOCKARD CHANNING

Date of Birth: February 13, 1944

Birth name: Susan Antonia Williams Stockard

One of Broadway's most celebrated actresses, Stockard Channing is also among Hollywood's most respected performers.

Susan Williams Antonia Stockard was a New York debutante and Radcliffe student who, in the mid-'60s, decided to try her hand at the stage with the experimental Theatre Company of Boston. She eventually wound up in Hollywood, doing bit parts in movies and starring in failed TV pilots. In 1973 she finally got noticed in Joan River's satiric TV movie, The Girl Most Likely To...

Channing's all-out performance as Rizzo in Grease was a star-making turn—or at least it should have been. Lame efforts like the disco-basketball comedy The Fish That Saved Pittsburgh (yes, it's as bad as it sounds) and Safari 3000 followed, and Channing left Hollywood for the New York stage.

After a series of highly-acclaimed successes, including the 1985 production of Joe Egg, Channing returned to Hollywood. Content with playing character roles between Broadway vehicles, Channing was given the opportunity to reprise her 1990 stage role as society matron Ouisa Kittredge in the 1993 film version of Six Degrees of Separation. Her performance earned her an Oscar nomination for Best Actress, her first...so far.

In 1999, she decided to try her hand at the small screen and joined the cast of The West Wing, a television show about the President of the United States. Nominated for the third time for her role as First Lady Abby Bartlet on the show in 2002, she finally won the Emmy award. She has since received three more nominations for the same role in 2003, 2004 and 2005. In 2006 she was nominated for yet another Emmy for her role in the CBS series Out of Practice.

Married and divorced four times, Channing still bears her first husband's last name.

Filmography:

Multiple Sarcasms (2010)
Sparkle (2007)
3 Needles (2006)
Red Mercury (2005)
Must Love Dogs (2005)
Anything Else (2003)
Le Divorce (2003)
Behind the Red Door (2002)
Life, Or Something Like It (2002)
The Business of Strangers (2001)
Where the Heart Is (2000)
Isn't She Great (2000)
Other Voices (1999)
The Venice Project (1999)
Practical Magic (1998)
Lulu on the Bridge (1998) (voice)
Twilight (1998)
The First Wives Club (1996)
Moll Flanders (1996)
Up Close And Personal (1996)
Smoke (1995)
To Woo Fong, Thanks For Everything, Julie Newmar (1995)
Married To It (1993)
Six Degrees Of Separation (1993)
Bitter Moon/ Lune De Fiel (1992)
Meet The Applegates (1991)
Staying Together (1989)
A Time Of Destiny (1988)
Heartburn (1986)
The Men's Club (1986)
Without A Trace (1983)
Safari 3000 (1982)
The Fish That Saved Pittsburgh (1979)
The Cheap Detective (1978)
Grease (1978)
Sweet Revenge (1977)
The Big Bus (1976)
Dandy, The All American Girl (1976)
The Fortune (1975)
The Girl Most Likely To... (TV) (1973)
Up The Sandbox (1972)
The Hospital (1971)