Marisa Tomei
☼ Born on 4 December 1964, in Brooklyn, New York City, New York, USA
Biography
Marisa Tomei was born on December 4, 1964, in Brooklyn, New York, to Patricia "Addie" (Bianchi), a teacher of English, and Gary Tomei, a lawyer, both of Italian descent. Marisa has a brother, actor Adam Tomei. As a child, Marisa's mother frequently corrected her speech as to eliminate her heavy Brooklyn accent. As a teen, Marisa attended Edward R. Murrow High School and graduated in the class of 1982. She was one year into her college education at Boston University when she dropped out for a co-starring role on the CBS daytime drama As the World Turns (1956). Her role on that show paved the way for her entrance into film: in 1984, she made her film debut with a bit part in The Flamingo Kid (1984). Three years later, Marisa became known for her role as Maggie Lawton, Lisa Bonet's college roommate, on the sitcom A Different World (1987).
Her real breakthrough came in 1992, when she co-starred as Joe Pesci's hilariously foul-mouthed, scene-stealing girlfriend in My Cousin Vinny (1992), a performance that won her a Best Supporting Actress Oscar. Later that year, she turned up briefly as a snippy Mabel Normand in director Richard Attenborough's biopic Chaplin (1992), and was soon given her first starring role in Untamed Heart (1993). A subsequent starring role -- and attempted makeover into Audrey Hepburn -- in the romantic comedy Only You (1994) proved only moderately successful.
Marisa's other 1994 role as Michael Keaton's hugely pregnant wife in The Paper (1994) was well-recei
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ved, although the film as a whole was not. Fortunately for Tomei, she was able to rebound the following year with a solid performance as a troubled single mother in Nick Cassavetes' Unhook the Stars (1996) which earned her a Screen Actors Guild nomination for Best Supporting Actress. She turned in a similarly strong work in Welcome to Sarajevo (1997), and in 1998 did some of her best work in years as the sexually liberated, unhinged cousin of Natasha Lyonne's Vivian Abramowitz in Tamara Jenkins' Slums of Beverly Hills (1998). Marisa co-starred with Mel Gibson in the hugely successful romantic comedy What Women Want (2000) and during the 2002 movie award season, she proved her first Best Supporting Actress Oscar win was no fluke when she received her second nomination in the same category for the critically acclaimed dark drama, In the Bedroom (2001). She also made a guest appearance on the animated TV phenomenon The Simpsons (1989) as Sara Sloane, a movie star who falls in love with Ned Flanders. In 2006, she went on to do 4 episodes for Rescue Me (2004). She played Angie, the ex-wife of Tommy Calvin (Denis Leary)'s brother Johnny (Dean Winters). At age 42, Marisa took on a provocative role in legendary filmmaker Sidney Lumet's melodramatic picture Before the Devil Knows You're Dead (2007), in which she appeared nude in love scenes with costars Ethan Hawke and Philip Seymour Hoffman. Marisa then took on another provocative role as a stripper in the highly acclaimed film The Wrestler (2008) opposite Mickey Rourke. Her great performance earned her many awards from numerous film societies for Best Supporting Actress, a third Academy Award nomination, as well as nominations for a Golden Globe and a BAFTA. Many critics heralded this performance as a standout in her career.
In the role of actor
Spider-Man: No Way Home (19/12/2021)
Spider-Man and Doctor Strange inadvertently open up the multiverse in Spider-Man: No Way Home. The world of Peter Parker (Tom Holland) turns upside down after J. Jonah Jameson (J.K. Simmons) publicly reveals a video, where Mysterio (Jake Gyllenhaal) reveals Peter’s secret identity as Spider-Man and frames him for Mysterio’s own death. This turns the world […]
The King of Staten Island (15/06/2020)
A basement-dwelling aspiring tattoo artist begins to take the first steps towards a meaningful life in The King of Staten Island. Scott Carlin (Pete Davidson) is a 24-year-old high school dropout, who lives in the basement of his mother Margie (Marisa Tomei) and has aspirations about being a tattoo artist. Life becomes complicated for Scott […]
Spider-Man: Far from Home (03/07/2019)
In the aftermath of Avengers: Endgame, Peter Parker tries to focus on his school vacation in Spider-Man: Far from Home. Reeling from the recent death of his mentor Tony Stark, Peter Parker (Tom Holland) is ready to take a break from being Spider-Man and focus on his upcoming class trip to Europe, where he hopes […]
Spider-Man: Homecoming (10/07/2017)
The webcrawler officially enters the Marvel cinematic universe in Spider-Man: Homecoming. After assisting Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.) during Captain America: Civil War, Peter Parker (Tom Holland) is desperate to become a full-time Avenger. However, Stark would prefer than Peter focus on his high school studies. However, when he finds out that a criminal named Adrian Toomes […]
Love, Marilyn (06/04/2013)
More than fifty years after her death, Marilyn Monroe remains one of the most infamous of Hollywood tragedies. Even though she had a very high ambition to succeed as an actress, she fell victim to typecasting and substance abuse. There have been countless biographies about Marilyn over the years, with the most recent example being […]
The Ides of March (13/10/2011)
There isn’t really too much to the story of The Ides of March, which is very by-the-book political drama. Essentially the film follows an idealist staff member (Ryan Gosling) of a potential presidential candidate (George Clooney), who is slowly corrupted by all the backroom backstabbing that happens in the political world. The cast of the […]
Cyrus (06/07/2010)
Cyrus is the first somewhat mainstream from the “mumblecore” duo of Jay and Mark Duplass. The film deals with a divorced man (John C. Reilly), who begins a relationship with a woman (Marisa Tomei) and has to deal with her overprotective (and somewhat sociopathic) son (Jonah Hill). Jonah Hill is mostly known for his loudmouth roles […]