Lindsay Crouse
Lindsay Crouse | |
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 Lindsay Crouse is well known for her starring role in 1987 in House of Games. |
Lindsay Ann Crouse (born May 12, 1948) is an American actress.
A Theatrical Family
Crouse was born in New York City, the daughter of Anna Erskine and Russel Crouse, a playwright.[1] Her full name—Lindsay Ann Crouse—is an intentional tribute to the Broadway writing partnership of Lindsay and Crouse.
Her father, playwright Russel Crouse, and his writing partner, Howard Lindsay, wrote much of The Sound of Music. [2] Their 1946 play State of the Union won that year's Pulitzer Prize for Drama. Their last collaboration was Mr. President in 1962. "In our family, the work ethic was held up as some kind of byword," Crouse says. "At any hour, somebody's typewriter was going."[3]
Crouse married another playwright, David Mamet, in 1977. Crouse caught Mamet's eye in the hockey movie, Slap Shot. When he heard she had a part in his play Reunion at the Yale Repertory Theater, Mamet packed a bag and told a friend, "I'm going to New Haven to marry Lindsay Crouse."[4] When Crouse and Mamet married, Crouse's mother took her aside and told her what Oscar Hammerstein had told her when she married Russel Crouse: "A playwright's wife is the only woman who knows how her husband feels when she's having a baby."[4] They have two daughters Willa and Zosia. They divorced in 1990. [5]
Her brother is Timothy Crouse, author of The Boys on the Bus about political journalism during the 1972 presidential campaign, and co-authored a new libretto for the musical Anything Goes with John Weidman that opened at the Vivian Beaumont Theatre on Broadway on October 19, 1987, and ran for 784 performances. [6]
Acting career
After graduating from Radcliffe in 1970,[3] Crouse began her performing career as a modern and jazz dancer but she soon switched to acting and made her broadway debut in Much Ado About Nothing in 1972.[1]
She is best known for her starring role in House of Games, the 1987 film directed and written by Mamet in which she plays Margaret Ford, a psychiatrist who is intrigued by the art of the con. "It's always hard to be directed by someone who's close to you," she recalls, "because everybody needs to go home and complain about the director. Everybody." [1]
Crouse was nominated for a Best Supporting Actress Oscar for her role in the 1984 movie Places in the Heart.
Crouse is also known for role in the fourth season of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, where she was a recurring supporting cast member playing Professor Maggie Walsh. She is also notable for playing Lily Braden, the discontented wife of hockey player Ned Braden, in the comedy classic Slap Shot.
In recent years Crouse wishes she could make more movies but has concentrated on the theater. "Once you get your driver's license, you end your film career," says Crouse. "Look at my generation. Great actresses like Glenn Close and Susan Sarandon -- there's nothing written for anyone over a certain age." [7]
In 2007 Crouse opened a one woman show, The Belle of Amherst, about the life of Emily Dickinson at the Gloucester Stage in Gloucester, Massachusetts. "You can't stop and recite something. You have to keep the poetry very, very active, which is pretty easy with Dickinson. She was striving so hard to understand what life was about. It's very dramatic poetry in that way," says Crouse. [8]
Buddhist Beliefs
Crouse is a Buddhist and since 2005 has organized an annual Buddhist educational program at a retreat at Windhover in Rockport, Massachusetts. [9] "[Buddhism] is not an exclusive club. It has something to offer everyone at all levels. Buddhism is dynamic and has captured the interests of Americans. Even our quantum physics validate ideas the Buddha taught 2,500 years ago," says Crouse. [10]
Filmography
- Mr. Brooks (2007)
- Cherish (2002)
- Impostor (2002)
- Almost Salinas (2001)
- The Insider (1999)
- Progeny (1998)
- Prefontaine (1997)
- If These Walls Could Talk (1996)
- Norma Jean & Marilyn (1996)
- The Arrival (1996)
- The Juror (1996)
- Bye Bye Love (1995)
- The Indian in the Cupboard (1995)
- Being Human (1993)
- Parallel Lives (1994)
- Desperate Hours (1990)
- Columbo:Sex and the Married Detective (1989)
- Communion (1989)
- Lemon Sky (1988)
- House of Games (1987)
- Iceman (1984)
- Places in the Heart (1984)
- Krull (1983) (re-dubbed dialogue only)
- Daniel (1983)
- The Verdict (1982)
- Prince of the City (1981)
- Between the Lines (1977)
- Slap Shot (1977)
- All the President's Men (1976)
References
- ^ a b Film Reference. "Lindsay Crouse Biography (1948-)."
- ^ Boston Globe. "Crouse plays the belle" by Wendy Killeen. July 22, 2007
- ^ a b New York Times. "Lindsay Crouse keeps up a Family Stage Tradition." January 2, 1981.
- ^ a b New York Times. "For Mamet and Crouse, A Movie is a Family Affair." October 11, 1987.
- ^ Theatre Database. "David Mamet (1947-)"
- ^ Mediabistro.com "Q&A: Timothy Crouse" by Greg Bloom. November 2, 2004.
- ^ http://www.boston.com/ae/celebrity/articles/2007/07/20/shedding_light_on_sunshine/
- ^ http://www.innewsweekly.com/innews/?class_code=Ar&article_code=4233
- ^ http://www.gloucestertimes.com/punews/local_story_204234220.html
- ^ http://www.lamamarut.org/wp-content/uploads/2007/02/wind_aug05.pdf