Virginia Madsen's portrayal of Maya, the wine-loving and emotionally fragile waitress in the dark comedy Sideways, earned her a 2004 Oscar nomination as best supporting actress. Madsen had seemed to be on the cusp of stardom twenty years earlier, in 1984, when she appeared as the cello-player-next-door in the romantic comedy Electric Dreams and as Princess Irulan in the sci-fi epic Dune. But her big breakthrough role never quite came. Instead, for the next two decades she took parts in a scattershot mix of TV movies like Long Gone (1987, with William Petersen) and studio 'B' movies like the sequel Highlander II (1991, with Sean Connery) and the horror flick Candyman (1992). The quirky independent film Sideways cast her as a wine enthusiast on the cusp of middle age who begins an awkward romance with a nebbish played by Paul Giamatti. The film was a surprise hit, winning five Academy Award nominations (including one for best picture and a supporting actor nomination for Thomas Haden Church). She followed that success with a Harrison Ford thriller, Firewall (2006), an all-star film version of Garrison Keillor's A Prairie Home Companion (2006) and a TV series, Smith (2006, co-starring Ray Liotta).
Virginia Madsen is the sister of the actor Michael Madsen... She was married to the director and actor Danny Huston (son of John Huston) from 1988-91... She had a son Jack (b. 1994) with the actor Antonio Sabato... Madsen played Marion Davies, the mistress of William Randolph Hearst, in the 1985 TV film The Hearst and Davies Affair.
Career Highlights: Candyman, The Hot Spot, Creator
First Major Screen Credit: Electric Dreams (1984)
Biography
Although she garnered some attention at the outset of her Hollywood career, Virginia Madsen found her star eclipsed in the 1990s by her older brother Michael's jolting, thuggish performances for director Quentin Tarantino. After landing a plum role in the acclaimed 2004 indie Sideways, however, Madsen was showered with the kind of praise she'd been denied for nearly two decades in the business.
A native of the Chicago suburbs and the daughter of a PBS documentarian, Madsen learned her trade in city theater productions and summer performance camps. She made her way to Hollywood in the early '80s with her then-fiancé/fellow performer Billy Campbell. Making an inauspicious debut at the age of 19 as Andrew McCarthy's would-be first-time conquest in the teen sex comedy Class, she would go on to more noteworthy roles in director David Lynch's sci-fi epic Dune and the slick but heartfelt romantic comedy Electric Dreams (both 1984). The rest of the decade wouldn't be quite as kind, as Madsen shuffled from part to part, appearing in a supporting capacity in both ambitious arthouse fare (1987's Slamdance) and forgettable Hollywood comedies (1988's Hot to Trot and Mr. North, the latter of which sparked a relationship with -- and three-year marriage to -- director Danny Huston). The beginning of the next decade fared somewhat better for Madsen. After a memorably brassy turn opposite Don Johnson in Dennis Hopper's steamy, seamy The Hot Spot (1990), she raked in some box-office cash in the minor horror hit Candyman (1992). Small performances in the high-profile, prestige pics Ghosts of Mississippi and The Rainmaker notwithstanding, Madsen all but disappeared from the late-'90s feature marketplace, as most of her films were either made for television or delivered directly to video-store rental shelves. Finding a more receptive outlet on weekly TV, Madsen snagged prominent recurring roles on NBC's Frasier and American Dreams around the turn of the century.
But it was writer/director Alexander Payne's low-budget character study Sideways that had Madsen clamoring for the ever-elusive "role of a lifetime." Payne was mostly unfamiliar with the actress' work, but her audition for the part of Maya -- a weary, contemplative divorcée with a fine-tuned taste for wine -- convinced him that she was the perfect complement to lead performer Paul Giamatti's high-strung sad sack Miles. Toning down her Hollywood glamour for the film, Madsen turned the small part into something of a revelation, and as reviewers showered praise upon the film in late 2004, the actress hauled in a truckload of awards from critics' groups as well as Golden Globe and Oscar nominations for Best Supporting Actress.
Although Madsen lost the Oscar bid to Cate Blanchett, high-profile offers rolled in after her Sideways coup. Early in 2006, she played Beth Stanfield, the wife of Harrison Ford's technology executive Jack Stanfield, in Richard Loncraine's disappointing hostage thriller Firewall; that summer, she also claimed an enigmatic part as a beguiling angel of death in Robert Altman's swan song, A Prairie Home Companion. Madsen began 2007 with two supporting turns in the same February weekend: in Michael Polish's The Astronaut Farmer, a quirky drama about a retired NASA astronaut turned farmer (Billy Bob Thornton) who builds a spacecraft in his barn; and in the higher-profile supernatural thriller The Number 23, playing wife to an unraveling Jim Carrey. ~ Michael Hastings, All Movie Guide
Virginia Madsen (born September 11, 1961) is an American actress. She came to fame during the 1980s, having appeared in several films aimed at a teenage audience. Two decades later, she once again became known after an Academy Award and Golden Globe-nominated role in the 2004 film Sideways. She also starred in the slasher classic Candyman.
Her first effort as a thespian was as her brother’s assistant in magic shows the two would concoct for their family. She later attended the Ted Liss Acting Studio in Chicago and Harand Camp Adult Theater Seminar in Elkhart Lake, Wisconsin. Of her experience with Liss, she said:
“
I had wanted to join his class since I was 12. It was well worth the wait because I don't think I could have got that sort of training anywhere else especially in the United States...I always wanted to make a real career out of acting.[6]
”
Career
Audiences first caught a glimpse of Madsen in a bit part she landed as Lisa in the teen sex comedy Class. She portrayed a role as cellist named Madeline in Electric Dreams (1984) which was the first film release by Virgin Films Production Company. She was cast as Princess Irulan in David Lynch's science fiction epic Dune (1984).[7]
She appeared with Kenny Loggins in the music video "I'm Free" in 1984. This was a track on the "Footloose" soundtrack.
Madsen first became popular with audiences in 1986 with her portrayal of a Catholic schoolgirl who fell in love with a boy from a prison camp in Duncan Gibbons's Fire with Fire. As beauty queen Dixie Lee Boxx, she was the sexy romantic interest of minor-league baseball manager Cecil "Stud" Cantrell (William Petersen) in the made-for-cable Long Gone (1987). She also appeared as Maddie Hayes' cousin in the final season of Moonlighting. She also starred in the 1992 slasher filmCandyman.
She was also co-host of the TV series Unsolved Mysteries in 1999, the show's final season on CBS.
Madsen turned in a solid performance in a small but key role in the Francis Ford Coppola drama The Rainmaker (1997) starring Matt Damon. Film critic Roger Ebert said that Madsen had a "strong scene,"[8] while reviewer James Berardinelli noted that "the supporting cast is solid, with turns from... Virginia Madsen as a witness for the plaintiff".[9] Madsen had spent more than twenty years in minor films before her breakout critically acclaimed performance in Sideways (2004). The role catapulted her onto the fabled Hollywood A-list.[10] Her first major role after Sideways was opposite Harrison Ford in Firewall. She later appeared in Robert Altman's A Prairie Home Companion, in a key role as the angel. She co-starred with Jim Carrey in The Number 23 and Billy Bob Thornton in The Astronaut Farmer; both films opened in North America on February 23, 2007.
During the filming of Candyman Madsen was hypnotised by a hypnotist in order for her pupils to be dilated so she could act out certain scenes. Director Bernard Rose wanted the character to not have the typical screaming style of when confronted with the main villain as done in many other horror films. Madsen did state in an interview for the DVD in 2004 there were some days during filming she did not remember much at all due to the hypnotism. She told director Bernard Rose that she did not want to be hypnotised after the initial few experiences.
When Madsen arrived in Hollywood, she was engaged to actor Billy Campbell. She married actor Danny Huston in 1989 and they divorced in 1992. Madsen also had a relationship with actor Antonio Sabàto, Jr., with whom she had a son, Jack Antonio (born August 6, 1994).
Madsen has heterochromia, a genetic trait resulting in different pigmentation of the eyes. Madsen has one green eye, and one half-green, half-brown eye. Her brother, actor Michael Madsen, does not share this trait, however.
^ Madsen's opening monologue from Dune ("In this time, the most precious substance in the universe is the spice melange. The spice extends life. The spice expands consciousness.") was later sampled by Israel-based group [[Astral Projection (group)|]] in their tracks "Dancing Galaxy" and "Ambient Galaxy" on their album Dancing Galaxy, and by drum'n'bass artist Aphrodite in his song "Spice (Even Spicier)."
