Catherine Zeta-Jones won an Oscar as best supporting actress for her deliciously villainous femme fatale in the 2002 film Chicago. Originally more popular in the U.K. than in the U.S., Zeta-Jones was a hit on both sides of the Atlantic as the love interest of Antonio Banderas in the 1998 movie The Mask of Zorro. She quickly became an A-list star, often cast as a wily and sexy schemer. Her profile was boosted by her movie-star romance with actor Michael Douglas. The two were married in 2000, not long after they completed filming Steven Soderbergh's Traffic. While raising children she's kept active in the movies, often in romantic comedies such as the Coen brothers' Intolerable Cruelty (2003), Soderbergh's Ocean's Twelve (2004, with George Clooney), the sequel The Legend of Zorro (2005) and No Reservations (2007, with Abigail Breslin).
Zeta-Jones was a prominent spokesperson for T-Mobile phones from 2002-2006.
Born: Sep 25, 1969 in Swansea, West Glamorgan, Wales
Occupation: Actor
Active: '90s-2000s
Major Genres: Comedy, Drama
Career Highlights: Traffic, The Mask of Zorro, America's Sweethearts
First Major Screen Credit: Les 1001 Nuits (1990)
Biography
Both exotic and classic, Wales-born actress Catherine Zeta-Jones began acting as a child. By ten she was part of the Catholic congregation's performing troupe, and by 18 she was performing professionally in the West End. It was in there that she caught the eye of French director Philippe de Broca, who offered her the lead in his film Les 1001 Nuits in 1989. After traveling to France to film the movie, she returned to Britain, where she landed a starring role in the Yorkshire Television comedy drama series The Darling Buds of May, based on a series of novels by H.E. Bates. The show was a huge hit, and made Zeta-Jones one of the U.K.'s most popular TV actresses. After the series ended in 1993, she steadily found work playing lead roles in TV movies and miniseries such as Catherine the Great and The Cinder Path. She also played supporting roles small films, including Christopher Columbus: The Discovery and Splitting Heirs.
The big screen role that undoubtedly put Zeta-Jones on the map, however, came in 1998 when she was cast opposite Anthony Hopkins and Antonio Banderas in 1998's The Mask of Zorro. America was enchanted by the dark-haired actress' charisma and beauty, and she began to be offered better and better roles in American film. She starred in films like Entrapment, The Haunting, and High Fidelity, before taking the prominent role of a white-collar drug kingpin's wife in 2000, in Steven Soderbergh's treatise on the drug war, Traffic. Her performance was impressive to critics and audiences, many of whom felt that she deserved an Oscar nomination.
The actress had no time to quibble over awards, however, as she married actor Michael Douglas in November that year, and gave birth to their son Dylan Michael nine months later. Zeta-Jones' took it easy during the next year, appearing only in the romantic comedy America's Sweethearts, but her next project would be the one to cement her as Hollywood royalty: a starring role in the Broadway adaptation Chicago. Few fans were aware of the singing and dancing skills that she'd honed on the musical stage at the beginning of her career, much less that she had sometimes performed with the English National Opera. Her performance blew audiences away, and won her the 2002 Oscar for Best Actress in a Supporting Role. Zeta-Jones lightened things up in 2003, making audiences laugh alongside George Clooney in the Cohen Brothers' movie Intolerable Cruelty, then as an airport employee who falls for stranded immigrant Tom Hanks in The Terminal (2004).
The actress's screen time, however, began to diminish at about that point, given her decision to shift priorities and hone in on raising a family with Douglas; her film appearances grew decidedly less frequent, and she thus found time to give birth to a baby girl named Carys Zeta Douglas in April of 2003. On the side, however, she continued to appear in occasional commercials, and the paparazzi often published candid photos of the actress in public, baby-in-arms, which held her in the limelight. The motion pictures in which Zeta-Jones appeared during this period took fewer chances by banking off of recent successes (gone, at least temporarily, were the challenges of such films as Chicago and Traffic). Efforts during this period included the blockbuster sequel Ocean's Twelve (with Clooney, 2004), the onscreen reunion with Antonio BanderasThe Legend of Zorro and even the musical concert film Tony Bennett: An American Classic, which reunited Zeta-Jones and Chicago wunderkind Rob Marshall.
Zeta-Jones then essayed a trio of roles in 2007. She first teamed with Shine director Scott Hicks for an Americanized remake of the German-language comedy Mostly Martha. Retitled No Reservations and issued in July of 2007, the picture casts Zeta-Jones as Kate Armstrong a chef suddenly appointed guardian her niece Zoe (Abigail Breslin). Kate's blossoming romance with another culinary maestro (Aaron Eckhart) puts the guardianship into much needed perspective. In Coming Out - a gender-bending comedy directed by Joel Zwick -- Zeta Jones plays a young woman who teaches a gay cabaret dancer to parlay his fancy footwork into winning soccer moves.
Zeta-Jones then starred in Australian director Gillian Armstrong's period piece Death Defying Acts - a cinematization of Harry Houdini's 1926 tour of Britain, co-starring Timothy Spall and Guy Pearce, and scripted by Brian Ward and Tony Grisoni. The Weinstein company slated that picture for release in mid-late 2007.
Zeta-Jones, the middle of three children, was born Catherine Zeta Jones[1] in Treboeth, a working-class area of
Swansea, West Glamorgan, in South Wales. Her father, David "Dai" Jones, is Welsh and a former sweets factory owner, and her mother,
Patricia (Fair), is Irish and a seamstress.[2][3] Her father's cousin is
married to singer Bonnie Tyler, who is also from Swansea.
Her uncle owns Swansea's Škoda car dealership as well as Llanelli A.F.C. football club. Her name stems from those of her grandmothers — her maternal grandmother,
Katherine Fair, and her paternal grandmother, Zeta Jones.
Zeta-Jones was raised Catholic.[1][4][5] After her parents won £100,000 at bingo in
the 1980s, they moved to St. Andrews Drive in Mayals, an upper class area of Swansea. Zeta-Jones
attended Dumbarton House School in Swansea. Comedian and actor Rob
Brydon also went there. She left school early to further her acting ambitions without obtaining O levels and went on to attend The Arts
Educational Schools in Chiswick for a full-time three year course in musical theatre.
Career
Zeta-Jones' stage career began in childhood. She often performed at friends and family functions when she was younger. She was
a part of a Catholic congregation's performing troupe before she was 10. She also starred in a London production of Annie, as well as a version of Bugsy
Malone. By 1987 she was starring in 42nd Street as Peggy Sawyer in the
West End. Once the show closed, Zeta-Jones travelled to France, where she received the
lead role in French director Philippe de Broca's 1001 Nights (also known as
Sheherazade), her feature film debut.
Her exotic looks, along with her singing and dancing ability, suggested a promising future, but it was in a straight acting
role, as Mariette in the successful television adaptation of H. E. Bates'
The Darling Buds of May), that made her name. She briefly flirted with a
musical career, beginning with a part in the 1992 album: Jeff Wayne's
Musical Version Of Spartacus, from which the single "For All Time" was released in 1989. It failed to chart. She went on
to release the singles "In the Arms of Love", "I Can't Help Myself", and a duet with David Essex, "True Love Ways". The Duet was
her only chart single, reaching #38 in the UK singles chart in 1994. She also starred
in an episode of The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles, as well
as in Christopher Columbus: The Discovery.
She continued to find moderate success with a number of television projects, including The Return of the Native (1994)
and the mini-series Catherine the Great (1995). She also appeared
in Splitting Heirs (1993), a comedy starring Eric
Idle, Rick Moranis and John Cleese.
In 2003, she won an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for her performance as Velma Kelly in the film
Chicago. Chicago also won the Academy
Award for Best Picture that year. On 22 October, 2005,
she referenced her award, as guest host on the television show Saturday Night
Live, surrounded by four male dancers, mimicking the Bob Fosse-inspired
Chicago-style dancing, suggesting in song that, no matter how bad she might be that night, "They Can't Take My Oscar
Away".[7] For her role in Chicago, she
specifically requested a 1920s-style short bob haircut, so her face could be seen and fans
wouldn't doubt she did all her dancing herself.
Zeta-Jones is married to actor Michael Douglas. She has the same birthday as her
husband, although he is 25 years her senior. She claims that when they met, he used the line "I'd like to father your
children".[9] They were married at the Plaza Hotel in New York City on 18
November, 2000. A traditional Welsh choir (Côr Cymraeg Rehoboth) sang at her wedding;
her wedding ring includes a Celtic motif and was bought in the Welsh town of Aberystwyth.
Their son, Dylan Michael Douglas, was born 8 August, 2000. Their
daughter, Carys Zeta Douglas, was born April 20, 2003. While
pregnant with Carys, photos were published of Zeta-Jones smoking cigarettes on a private balcony; afterwards, she became the
target of anti-smoking and child health and welfare groups due to her behaviour.
Her elder brother, David A. Jones (also known as Cameron Jones), is Vice President of the film company, Initial Entertainment.
He was an executive producer of Gangs of New York. Her younger brother, Lyndon
Jones, is her personal manager and producer for Milkwood Films. Catherine's parents
recently moved from their Mayals property to a £2 million home two miles away, paid for by their daughter.
Apart from her acting career, Zeta-Jones is also an advertising spokeswoman. In 2003, she became spokeswoman for the
mobile phone company T-Mobile. However, in September
2006, T-Mobile dropped Zeta-Jones for a more “man on the street” advertising campaign.[10] She is currently the global spokeswoman for cosmetics giant Elizabeth Arden. Zeta-Jones lives predominantly with her family in Bermuda.
In popular culture
Dawn French and Jennifer Saunders parodied
Zeta-Jones as a vacuous über-celebrity named Catherine Spartacus-Zeta-Douglas-Jones on their show French & Saunders in the series Back With a Vengeance. Catherine
Spartacus-Zeta-Douglas-Jones alternates between a strong Welsh accent and a strong American accent and uses Welsh-language
phrases when she speaks.
In the U.S. version of the sitcom The Office, Catherine Zeta-Jones is the name of
Agent Michael Scarn's secretary/love interest in Michael Scott's screenplay
"Threat Level: Midnight".[11]
Search for answers directly from your browser with the FREE Answers.com Toolbar! Click here to download now. Get Answers your way! Check out all our free tools and products.
