Jennifer Lynn Connelly (born December 12, 1970) is an American film actress, who enjoyed a career as a child model after a friend of her parents suggested that she should audition. She subsequently appeared in magazine, newspaper and television advertising before making her motion picture debut in the 1984 crime film Once Upon a Time in America. Connelly continued her career as a model and actress, starring in films such as Labyrinth and Career Opportunities. She gained critical acclaim for her work in the 1998 science fiction film Dark City and for her portrayal of Marion Silver in Darren Aronofsky's 2000 drama Requiem for a Dream.
In 2002, Connelly won an Academy Award, a Golden Globe Award and a BAFTA award as a supporting actress for her portrayal of Alicia Nash in Ron Howard's biopic A Beautiful Mind. Other film credits include the Marvel superhero film Hulk, the thriller Dark Water, the drama Blood Diamond, the remake of The Day the Earth Stood Still and the romantic comedy He's Just Not That Into You.
When Connelly was ten years old, an advertising executive friend of her father suggested she audition as a model. As a result she joined the Ford Modeling Agency and began modelling in print advertisements, before moving on to television commercials. She appeared on the cover of several issues of Seventeen between 1986 and 1988. In December 1986 she recorded two pop songs for the Japanese market: "Monologue of Love" and "Message of Love",Connelly sang in phonetic Japanese as she did not speak the language.
Both films that she appeared in the following year were nominated for multiple Academy Awards. She played a major role in an adaptation of the novel Little Children alongside Kate Winslet, a movie which focuses on the relationship between Sarah Pierce (played by Winslet) and Brad Adamson (Patrick Wilson).Connelly co-starred in Blood Diamond opposite Leonardo DiCaprio where she portrayed journalist Maddy Bowen, who is working on exposing the real story behind blood diamonds.New York Magazine praised her performance: "Connelly is such a smart, sane, unhistrionic actress that she almost disguises the fact that her character is a wheeze."Her next appearance was as Grace in the drama Reservation Road with Joaquin Phoenix and Mark Ruffalo, a film that saw limited release in 2007. By her own account, the character she played in the movie proved tougher than any of her previous roles. USA Today's Susan Wloszczyna commented: "The strong performances of Jennifer Connelly and Mark Ruffalo [...] raise the film above overheated melodrama".
In 2009 she appeared in the costume drama biopic Creation, in which she played Emma Darwin, wife of Charles Darwin, opposite her real-life husband Paul Bettany. Set during the writing of On the Origin of Species, the movie depicts Darwin's struggle with the subject of the book as well as with his wife, who opposed his theories, and their mourning for their daughter Annie. The San Francisco Chronicle wrote: "Darwin's wife, a religious woman who disapproved of her husband's theories, is played by Jennifer Connelly, Bettany's real-life wife, in the kind of casting that doesn't always work, but it does here. We believe in the Darwins' history together, their familiarity and affection. Connelly's English accent is also as good as Renée Zellweger's and Gwyneth Paltrow's. She doesn't get just the sounds right, but also the music and the attitude". She then voiced the character named "7" in the animation film 9.According to Cinema Blend "Virginia is propped up by a strong central performance, with Connelly doing some of her best work in years".
Beautiful Eyes Jennifer Connelly
In 2011, Connelly starred in Ron Howard's comedy The Dilemma, which premiered on January 14 that year. Connelly played Beth, opposite Vince Vaughn. Although the Austin Chronicle's review noted "Vaughn nails it, and his nicely nuanced everyguy performance is aided by the always-excellent Connelly", the movie opened to generally negative reviews. Variety Magazine wrote: "Connelly, though a shade looser and more spontaneous than usual, seems stuck at an emotional remove from the action".Her next project, George Ratliff's Salvation Boulevard, premiered during the 2011 Sundance Film Festival. In the film Connelly played Gwen, the wife of Carl Vanderveer (Greg Kinnear); the couple are members of the Church of the Third Millennium, led by pastor Dan (Pierce Brosnan).
Connelly has stated that she prefers life with her husband and children when she is not working and in 2009 cited her family, with whom she lives in TriBeCa, New York City, as the most important thing in her life.Her first son, Kai, was born in 1997, from her relationship with photographer David Dugan. In 2009, she stated "Becoming a mother has made all the difference in terms of learning to take more responsibility for myself and my life[...] Parenthood changed the way I do everything." Once a vegan, she gave it up during her first pregnancy. On January 1, 2003, she married the actor Paul Bettany, whom she met while working on A Beautiful Mind, in a private family ceremony in Scotland. The couple's first child and Connelly's second, Stellan, named after their friend, actor Stellan Skarsgård, was born the same year. She gave birth to her third child, Agnes Lark, on May 31, 2011 in New York City.
