Zooey Deschanel
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Zooey Claire Deschanel (born 17 January, 1980) is an American actress.
Biography
Early life
Deschanel was born in Los Angeles, California, the daughter of Academy Award-nominated cinematographer Caleb Deschanel and actress Mary Jo Weir; her sister, Emily Deschanel, is also an actress. Her paternal grandfather was French and the remainder of her ancestry is Irish American.[link] The name "Zooey" (rhymes with "Joey") was inspired by the male character of the same name in J. D. Salinger's novel Franny and Zooey.Zooey attended the French Woods Festival of the Performing Arts, an elite performance summer camp located in New York. Zooey attended Northwestern University before dropping out to pursue her acting career
Career
Noted for her unconventional beauty and a chameleon-like ability to change personas to suit a given role, Deschanel has steadily expanded her Hollywood profile. After her film debut in Lawrence Kasdan’s (1999) comedy Mumford, Deschanel drew attention with eye-catching roles as Patrick Fugit’s hippie older sister in Cameron Crowe’s acclaimed Almost Famous (2000) (a movie featuring fellow Crossroads graduate Kate Hudson) and the gothy, disaffected drugstore make-up clerk in the Jennifer Aniston film The Good Girl (2002). She won high praise for her sensitive, naturalistic portrayal of an innocent, self-assured, sexually curious 18-year-old virgin who has a life-changing romance with an aimless 22-year-old man (Paul Schneider) in David Gordon Green’s acclaimed cult film All the Real Girls (2003); Deschanel was voted Best Actress at the Mar del Plata Film Festival and nominated for an Independent Spirit Award. More recently, she played a department store elf opposite Will Ferrell in the popular Christmas comedy Elf (2003), and starred as Trillian in the movie adaptation of Douglas Adams's science fiction series The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (2005).Deschanel has appeared on the talk show circuit (including Jay Leno and David Letterman) and presented film industry awards. Her TV portfolio also includes Frasier and various MTV clips including The Offspring's video "She's Got Issues".
She appears with fellow actress Samantha Shelton in a cabaret act named If All the Stars Were Pretty Babies. She has performed vocally in several of her films (Elf, Once Upon a Mattress, The New Guy, Winter Passing) and her composition "Bittersuite" was used thematically in Winter Passing in which she starred along with Ed Harris, Will Ferrel and Amelia Warner. She is slated to portray Liza Minnelli in the upcoming bio-pic Simply Halston joining Brendan Fraser who is cast in the title role.
Private life
Deschanel is a huge fan of singer Ella Fitzgerald and actress Parker Posey. One of her favourite songs is "Don't Stop Believin'" by Journey.Filmography
| Year | Film | Role | Other notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2007 | Surf's Up | Lani | Filming |
| 2006 | ''The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford | Dorothy Evans | Filming |
| 2006 | Failure to Launch | Kit | |
| 2006 | Flakes | Miss Katz | Post-production |
| 2006 | Live Free or Die | Cheryl | Post-production |
| 2006 | Winter Passing | Reese Holden | |
| 2005 | Once Upon a Mattress | Lady Larkin | |
| 2005 | The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy | Trillian | |
| 2004 | Eulogy | Kate Collins | |
| 2003 | Elf | Jovie | |
| 2003 | House Hunting | Christy | |
| 2003 | It's Better to be Wanted for Murder Than Not to be Wanted at All | Gas station girl | |
| 2003 | All the Real Girls | Noel | |
| 2003 | Whatever We Do | Nikki | |
| 2002 | Abandon | Samantha Harper | |
| 2002 | Sweet Friggin' Daisies | Zelda | |
| 2002 | The New Guy | Nora | |
| 2002 | Big Trouble | Jenny Herk | |
| 2002 | The Good Girl | Cheryl | |
| 2001 | Manic | Tracy | |
| 2000 | Almost Famous | Anita Miller | |
| 1999 | Mumford | Nessa Watkins |
External links
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