A tough, no-nonsense blonde of the Barbara Stanwyck school, Bronx-born Ellen Barkin made her belated acting debut at the age of 26 in a 1980 New York stage production of “Irish Coffee” and later appeared in the original off-Broadway presentation of “Extremities”. She learned the “on camera” ropes as a cast member of the soap opera “Search for Tomorrow” before making her feature debut as the unappreciated wife who misfiles her husband’s records in Barry Levinson’s ensemble film “Diner” (1982). Roles as Robert Duvall’s headstrong daughter in “Tender Mercies” and Timothy Hutton’s wife in “Daniel” (both 1993) followed, but it would not be until “Desert Bloom” (1986) that she opened Hollywood’s eyes to her sultry potential, delivering a wonderfully splashy turn as an unlucky but resilient sexpot and enlivening the picture whenever on screen. Barkin had never looked better, and she soon capitalized on her sexy new image by breaking into leading roles.
“The Big Easy” (1987) featured an attraction of opposites, pairing Barkin as an uptight, recent Northern import to the New Orleans D.A.’s office with the homegrown local cop (Dennis Quaid) she would eventually prosecute. Despite her initial reservations, Quaid finally turns her on, and the resultant sex scene, while not tremendously explicit, was certainly a temperature raiser, assuring her of even “hotter” roles to come. Although she missed with her sexy firebrand on her return to The Big Easy in “Johnny Handsome”, creating a truly despicable femme gang member, Barkin was in top form as the hard-bitten, voraciously carnal suspect romantically linked to weary, bourbon-slugging cop Al Pacino in “Sea of Love” (both 1989). Concealing her emotional vulnerability beneath her big-city single woman’s armor, she matched Pacino stride for stride, the two presenting a realistic portrayal of an uncertain couple, and the steamy sex scenes between them raised her “bombshell” quotient exponentially.
Unfortunately, Barkin’s tour de force performance was one she would find a tough time topping, and her marriage to actor Gabriel Byrne (whom she met filming “Siesta” 1987) and subsequent crossing of the pond to explore motherhood removed her from the loop and hurt her career. Although she was the bright point of Blake Edwards’ otherwise flat sex farce “Switch” (1991), there was nothing she could do for the ill-conceived “Man Trouble” (1992), which wasted the talents of everybody involved, including star Jack Nicholson, director Bob Rafelson and screenwriter Carole Eastman (the three trying to repeat the success of their “Five Easy Pieces”). She had her best role since “Sea of Love” in “This Boy’s Life” (1993), playing the put-upon wife of Robert De Niro (which amounted to a more grown-up version of her “Diner” role), but her hot-and-heavy sex with Laurence Fishburne in “Bad Company” (1995) was the only thing that stood out amidst the never-ending series of double-crosses culminating in a “who cares?” finale.
Barkin didn’t quite come across as a scruffy Calamity Jane in Walter Hill’s artless Western “Wild Bill” (also 1995), and though she was fine in her small role in Tony Scott’s sports thriller “The Fan” (1996), that film squandered the talented likes of De Niro, Wesley Snipes and John Leguizamo. She appeared in the gangster comedy “Mad Dog Time” (also 1996), which put her in close proximity to ex-husband Byrne, and had a cameo as a waitress in Terry Gilliam’s “Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas” (1998), but a return to TV provided her best opportunity in ages. Sharing the screen with producer Oprah Winfrey, she earned an Emmy as the embittered mother of two who turns to the bottle, big time, to ease the pain of a tragic past in ABC’s “Before Women Had Wings” (1997). Some of her earlier TV-movies were “We’re Fighting Back” (CBS, 1981), James Cagney’s swan song, “Terrible Joe Morgan” (CBS, 1984), “The Princess Who Never Laughed” (Showtime, 1986), and “Clinton and Nadine” (HBO, 1988), in which she starred opposite Andy Garcia.
In “Drop Dead Gorgeous†(1999), a mockumentary about a small town beauty pageant showcasing teenage innocence that goes horribly awry amidst back-stabbing rivals, Barkin played the chain-smoking, beer-swilling mother of one of the top contestants (Kirsten Dunst) who once competed for the prize herself. Then after an appearance as a blind prostitute in the straight-to-video adventure drama, “The White River Kid†(1999), she played the host of a big New York talk show in the by-the-book romantic comedy “Someone Like You†(2001), starring Ashley Judd and Hugh Jackman. Barkin then played the unhappy mother of a high school cheerleader (Monica Keena) who plots the death of her drunken husband only to be beaten to the punch by her raped daughter in the “Crime and Punishment in Suburbia†(2000), a loose—very loose—adaptation of Fyodor Dostoevsky’s masterwork on murder and redemption. After a turn as a bio tech executive who fires a whistleblower (Anthony Mackie) in the Spike Lee misfire “She Hate Me†(2004), Barkin played a mom who forces her unwilling daughter to have an abortion in “Palindromes†(2005), another feel good hit from Todd Solondz.
- Born:
on 04/16/54 in Bronx, New York
- Job Titles:
Actor, Waitress
Family
- Brother: George Barkin. former editor in chief of The National Lampoon; older
- Daughter: Romey Marion Byrne. born on November 18, 1992
- Father:
- Mother:
- Son: Jack Byrne. born in October 1989
- Step-children: has six total
- Step-daughter: Caleigh Perelman.
- Step-daughter: Samantha Perelman.
Significant Others
- Husband: Gabriel Byrne. Irish; married in 1988; separated in 1993; Barkin filed for divorce in May 1999
- Husband: Ronald Perelman. engaged as of spring 1999; married on June 28, 2000; his fourth marriage
- Companion: David Arquette. met on set of “Wild Bill”; born on September 8, 1971; no longer together
- Companion: Val Kilmer. dated c. 1984
Education
- The School of Performing Arts, New York, New York, 1972
Milestones
- 1969 Auditioned for the High School of the Performing Arts in NYC; accepted at age 15
- 1980 First stage role in “Irish Coffee” at the Ensemble Studio Theatre
- 1981 TV-movie debut in “We’re Fighting Back” (CBS)
- 1982 Appeared off-Broadway with Susan Sarandon in the original production of “Extremities”
- 1982 Film acting debut in Barry Levinson’s “Diner”
- 1985 Acted off-Broadway in “Eden Court”: critic Frank Rich said, “If it were really possible to give the kiss of life to a corpse, the actress Ellen Barkin would be the one to do it”
- 1986 Breakthrough leading role in “The Big Easy”
- 1987 First role with future husband Gabriel Byrne, “Siesta”
- 1989 Acted in Walter Hill’s “Johnny Handsome”
- 1989 Starred with Al Pacino in “Sea of Love”
- 1991 Cast as a man reincarnated in a woman’s body in “Switch”
- 1992 Played an opera singer in disappointing “Man Trouble”
- 1992 Reteamed with Byrne for Mike Newell’s “Into the West”, written by Jim Sheridan
- 1993 Acted opposite Robert De Niro in “This Boy’s Life”
- 1993 Appeared in John Turturro’s directing debut, “Mac”
- 1995 Portrayed Calamity Jane to Jeff Bridges’ “Wild Bill”; project reteamed her with director Hill
- 1996 Second film with De Niro, “The Fan”
- 1996 Third film with Byrne, Larry Bishop’s “Mad Dog Time”
- 1997 Won an Emmy for her work in ABC-movie “Before Women Had Wings,” produced by Oprah Winfrey’s Harpo Productions
- 1998 Contributed cameo to Terry Gilliam’s “Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas”
- 1999 Portrayed the mother of beauty contestant (Kirsten Dunst) in “Drop Dead Gorgeous”
- 2000 Appeared as Monica Keena’s mother in “Crime + Punishment in Suburbia”
- 2001 Signed to co-star with Ashley Judd and Marisa Tomei in “Someone Like You”
- 2004 Appeared in the Spike Lee Comedy “She Hate Me”
- 2005 Plays the mother of a teenager girl who is forced by her parents to have an abortion in “Palindromes” by director Todd Solondz
- Appeared in the daytime soap, “Search for Tomorrow”
