Claire Danes


Claire Catherine Danes is an American actress. She is the recipient of three Emmy Awards, four Golden Globe Awards, and two Screen Actors Guild Awards. In 2012, Time named her one of the 100 most influential people in the world, and she was awarded a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 2015.
Danes gained early recognition as Angela Chase in the 1994 teen drama series My So-Called Life. The role won her a Golden Globe Award for Best Actress and a Primetime Emmy nomination for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama Series. She made her film debut the same year in Little Women. Her other films include Home for the Holidays, Romeo + Juliet, The Rainmaker, Les Misérables, Brokedown Palace, the 1999 English dub of Princess Mononoke, The Hours, , Shopgirl, Stardust, and A Kid Like Jake.
From 1998 to 2000, Danes attended Yale University before dropping out to return to acting. She appeared in an Off-Broadway production of The Vagina Monologues in 2000, and made her Broadway debut playing Eliza Doolittle in the 2007 revival of Pygmalion. In 2010, she portrayed Temple Grandin in the highly acclaimed HBO TV film Temple Grandin, which won her a second Golden Globe and her first Primetime Emmy Award for the Outstanding Lead Actress in a Limited Series or Movie. From 2011 to 2020, she starred as Carrie Mathison in the Showtime drama series Homeland, for which she won two Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama Series, two Golden Globe Award for Best Actress – Television Series Drama, and the Television Critics Association Award for Individual Achievement in Drama.

Early life and education

Danes was born in the Manhattan borough of New York City, the daughter of sculptor and printmaking artist, Carla Danes, and photographer Christopher Danes. Her older brother, Asa, is a lawyer. During Danes' childhood her mother ran a small toddler day care center called "Danes Tribe" out of the family's SoHo loft and later served as Danes' manager. Danes' father worked as a residential general contractor in New York for 20 years in a company he ran called "Overall Construction". He also worked as a photographer and computer consultant. Danes is named after her paternal grandmother, Claire Danes.
The family lived in an artist's loft on Crosby Street. Danes attended P.S. 3 and PS 11 for elementary school and Professional Performing Arts School for junior high school. She attended the New York City Lab School for Collaborative Studies in New York City. She attended The Dalton School for one year of high school before moving with her parents to Santa Monica, California for the role in My So-Called Life. They moved two days after the 1994 Northridge earthquake.
Danes graduated from the Lycée Français de Los Angeles in 1997. In 1998, she began studies at Yale University. After studying for two years as a psychology major, she dropped out to focus on her film career.

Career

Danes started studying dance when she was six years old. Danes took dance classes from Ellen Robbins at Dance Theater Workshop and acting classes at HB Studio the Lee Strasberg Theatre and Film Institute at the age of 10. She appeared in theater and video productions in New York City. Although she continued to dance, Danes said that her focus shifted to acting by the time she was nine years old. Her audition with Miloš Forman when she was 11 led to roles in several student films. She signed with agent Karen Friedman at the Writers & Artists talent agency at age 12.

Television

At age 13, Danes got her first big job working on the Dudley Moore TV sitcom pilot called Dudley, which was shot at Silvercup Studios in Astoria, Queens. Danes played a teenage murderer in a guest starring role on Law & Order in the season three episode "Skin Deep". She appeared in an episode of HBO's entitled "The Coming out of Heidi Leiter". In March 1993, a pilot episode was shot, when she was 13 years old. It would be almost another year and a half before broadcast.
She then starred as the 15-year-old Angela Chase in the television drama series My So-Called Life. For her role, she won a Golden Globe Award and received an Emmy nomination. Despite being canceled after only 19 episodes, My So-Called Life has developed a large cult following. In 1995, she starred in the Soul Asylum music video for "Just Like Anyone".
In 2010, Danes starred in the HBO production of Temple Grandin, a biopic about the autistic animal scientist. She won the 2010 Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Miniseries or a Movie, the 2011 Golden Globe Award for Best Actress – Miniseries or Television Film and the 2011 Screen Actors Guild Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Television Movie or Miniseries award. The film was well received and Grandin herself praised Danes' performance.
From 2011 to 2020, Danes starred in the Showtime series Homeland in which she played Carrie Mathison, an agent of the CIA who has bipolar disorder. She won the 2013 Golden Globe and the 2012 Golden Globe for Best Actress in a Television Series for her performance. She also won the 2012 and 2013 Emmy for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama Series for her performance in Homeland. In 2012, TIME magazine named Danes one of the 100 most influential people in the world.

Film

Danes played Beth March in the 1994 film adaptation of Little Women. Although ABC canceled My So-Called Life in 1995, her higher profile led to being cast in several film roles, including 1995's Home for the Holidays and 1996's I Love You, I Love You Not and To Gillian on Her 37th Birthday.
Her first leading role on the big screen came in 1996, when she portrayed Juliet in the film Romeo + Juliet, inspiring director Baz Luhrmann to call her, at age 16, "the Meryl Streep of her generation". Later that year, it was reported that she turned down the female lead role in Titanic.
In 1997, Danes played abused wife Kelly Riker in The Rainmaker, directed by Francis Ford Coppola, as well as Jenny in Oliver Stone's noir U Turn.
In 1998, she played several very different roles: Cosette in Les Misérables, and the pregnant teenage daughter of Polish immigrants in Polish Wedding.
In 1999, she made her first appearance in an animated feature with the English version of Princess Mononoke. That same year, she played the role of Julie Barnes in the big screen adaptation of the 1970s TV show The Mod Squad. She also starred in Brokedown Palace.
Danes left her career temporarily to attend Yale, having made 13 films in five years. In 2002, she returned to film. She starred in Igby Goes Down. Later that year, she co-starred as Clarissa Vaughan's daughter in the Oscar-nominated film The Hours. The following year, she was cast in , followed by Stage Beauty in 2004. She earned critical acclaim in 2005 when she starred in Shopgirl and The Family Stone. In 2007, she appeared in the fantasy Stardust, which she described as a "classic model of romantic comedy". She appeared in the drama film Evening and The Flock. She was also featured in the film Me and Orson Welles.

Theater

Danes got her start in New York City theater appearing in performances of Happiness, Punk Ballet, and Kids Onstage, for which she choreographed her own dance. In April 2000, she appeared off Broadway in Eve Ensler's The Vagina Monologues. In November of that same year, she appeared as Emily Webb in a one night only staged reading of Thornton Wilder's Our Town at All Saints' Episcopal Church in Beverly Hills. The production was staged by Bess Armstrong, who had played the mother of Danes' character on My So-Called Life.
In September 2005, Danes returned to New York's Performance Space 122, where she had performed as a child. She appeared in choreographer Tamar Rogoff's solo dance piece "Christina Olson: American Model," where she portrayed the subject of Andrew Wyeth's famous painting Christina's World. Olson suffered from muscular deterioration that left her weak and partially paralyzed. Danes was praised for her dance skills and acting in the project.
In January 2007, Danes performed in Performance Space 122's Edith and Jenny. Later in 2007, Danes made her Broadway theatre debut as Eliza Doolittle in the Roundabout Theatre Company revival of George Bernard Shaw's Pygmalion, directed by David Grindley at the American Airlines Theatre.
In January 2012, Harvard University's Hasty Pudding Theatricals named Danes their 2012 Woman of the Year.
In March 2016, Danes performed in Dry Powder by Sarah Burgess at The Public Theater, starring alongside John Krasinski, Hank Azaria and Sanjit De Silva. The play was directed by Thomas Kail.

Other work

In 1995, Danes was the main character of Soul Asylum's music video for the song "Just Like Anyone".
In 1997, Danes wrote an introduction to Neil Gaiman's Death: The Time of Your Life.
In 2012, Danes's audiobook recording of Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale was released at Audible.com. Her performance won the 2013 Audie Award for fiction.
She hosted the 2013 Nobel Peace Prize Concert in Oslo.

Personal life

Danes has been in therapy since the age of six and considers it "a helpful tool and a luxury to self-reflect and get some insight".
Danes met Australian singer Ben Lee at her eighteenth birthday party in 1997. They dated for almost six years before their relationship ended in 2003.
Since 1998, Danes remains banned from the Philippines and her films also remain banned in the region. The ban came after Danes described Manila, capital of the country to have "smelled of cockroaches, with rats all over, and that there is no sewage system, and the people do not have anything – no arms, no legs, no eyes". Danes later apologized for these remarks, but the Filipino authorities refused to lift the ban.
In 2003, Danes began a relationship with Billy Crudup after he left his partner, Mary-Louise Parker, who was seven months pregnant at the time.. The relationship lasted until 2006.
Danes met actor Hugh Dancy on the set of Evening in 2006 in Newport, Rhode Island. They began dating and announced their engagement in February 2009. They married in France in a secret ceremony in late August or early September 2009. Their first child, a son, was born in 2012. Danes announced her second pregnancy on the Howard Stern Show in April 2018, and their second son was born in 2018.
Danes and her mother are supporters of the charity Afghan Hands, which helps women in Afghanistan gain independence, education, and livable wages. Danes is also a long time supporter of Donorschoose.org, a website that allows public school teachers to create project requests.
In 2015, Danes was awarded a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
Danes is a feminist, and has been critical of female underrepresentation within Hollywood.

Filmography

Film

Television

Stage

Awards and nominations

Emmy Awards (Primetime)

The Primetime Emmy Award is American award bestowed by the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences in recognition of excellence in U.S. primetime TV programming.
YearCategoryNominated workResult
1995Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama SeriesMy So-Called Life
2010Outstanding Lead Actress in a Limited Series or Television MovieTemple Grandin
2012Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama SeriesHomeland
2013Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama SeriesHomeland
2014Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama SeriesHomeland
2015Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama SeriesHomeland
2016Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama SeriesHomeland

Golden Globe Awards

The Golden Globe Awards are accolades bestowed by the 93 members of the Hollywood Foreign Press Association, recognizing excellence in film and television, both domestic and foreign.
YearCategoryNominated workResult
1994Best Actress in a Television Series – DramaMy So-Called Life
2010Best Actress in a Miniseries or Motion Picture – TelevisionTemple Grandin
2011Best Actress in a Television Series – DramaHomeland
2012Best Actress in a Television Series – DramaHomeland
2014Best Actress in a Television Series – DramaHomeland

Screen Actors Guild Awards

The Screen Actors Guild Award is an accolade given by the Screen Actors Guild‐American Federation of Television and Radio Artists to recognize outstanding performances in film and primetime television.
YearCategoryNominated workResult
2003Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Motion PictureThe Hours
2011Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Television Movie or MiniseriesTemple Grandin
2013Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Drama SeriesHomeland
2013Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Drama SeriesHomeland
2014Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Drama SeriesHomeland
2014Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Drama SeriesHomeland
2015Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Drama SeriesHomeland
2015Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Drama SeriesHomeland
2016Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Drama SeriesHomeland
2016Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Drama SeriesHomeland

Critics' Choice Awards

The Critics' Choice Awards—both film and television—are accolades presented by the Broadcast Film Critics Association .
YearCategoryNominated workResult
2012Best Actress – Television Drama SeriesHomeland
2013Best Actress – Television Drama SeriesHomeland

Satellite Awards

The Satellite Awards are annual awards given by the International Press Academy that are commonly noted in entertainment industry journals and blogs.
YearCategoryNominated workResult
2005Best Performance by an Actress in a Motion Picture – Comedy or MusicalShopgirl
2011Best Performance by an Actress in a Television Series – DramaHomeland
2012Best Performance by an Actress in a Television Series – DramaHomeland
2015Best Performance by an Actress in a Television Series – DramaHomeland

People's Choice Awards

The People's Choice Awards is an American awards show, recognizing the people and the work of popular culture, voted on by the general public.
YearCategoryNominated workResult
2015Favorite Premium Cable TV ActressHomeland
2016Favorite Premium TV Series ActressHomeland