Cynthia Nixon biography
Cynthia Ellen Nixon (born April 9, 1966) is an United States Tony Award- and two-time Emmy Award-winning actor who is known for her portrayal of lawyer Miranda Hobbes in the popular Home Box Office comedy-drama, and movie
Sex and the City (1998-2004, 2008).
Biography
Early life and career
Nixon was born in New York City, New York, the daughter of Anne Knoll, an actress, and Walter Nixon, a radio journalist. Her first onscreen appearance was as an imposter on
To Tell the Truth, where her mother worked. She began acting at age 12 as the object of a wealthy schoolmate's crush in The Seven Wishes of a Rich Kid, a 1979 American Broadcasting Company Afterschool Special. She made her feature debut co-starring with Kristy McNichol and Tatum O'Neal in
Little Darlings (1980). She made her Broadway theatre debut as the bratty Dinah Lord in a 1980 revival of
The Philadelphia Story. Alternating between film, TV and stage she did projects like the 1982 ABC-movie
My Body, My Child, the features
Prince of the City (1981) and
I Am the Cheese (1983) and the 1982 off-Broadway productions of John Guare's
Lydie Breeze. In 1985 she appeared alongside Jeff Daniels in Lanford Wilson's
Lemon Sky at Second Stage Theatre.
Nixon graduated from Hunter College High School, and made theatrical history while a freshman at Barnard College in 1984, simultaneously appearing in two hit Broadway plays directed by Mike Nichols. These were
The Real Thing (play), where Nixon played the daughter of Jeremy Irons and Christine Baranski; and
Hurlyburly, where she played a young woman who encounters sleazy Hollywood types. The two theaters were just two blocks apart and Nixon's roles were both short, so she could run from one to the other. That year's Academy award-winning Best Picture
Amadeus (film), directed by Milos Forman, also featured her in a brief role as Mozart's young servant-girl.
She landed her first major supporting part in a movie as an intelligent teenager who aids her boyfriend (Christopher Collet) in building a nuclear bomb in Marshall Brickman's
Manhattan Project (film) (1986). Nixon was part of the cast of the NBC miniseries
The Murder of Mary Phagan (NBC, 1988) starring Jack Lemmon and Kevin Spacey and portrayed the daughter of a presidential candidate (Michael Murphy) in
Tanner '88 (also 1988), Robert Altman's sharply-observed, episodic political satire for HBO--she would later reprise the role for the 2004 follow-up - Tanner on Tanner.
1990s
On stage, Nixon portrayed Juliet in a 1988 New York Shakespeare Festival production of
Romeo and Juliet and acted in the workshop production of Wendy Wasserstein's Pulitzer Prize-winning
The Heidi Chronicles, playing several characters after it came to Broadway in 1989. She replaced Marcia Gay Harden as a pill-popping Mormon wife whose husband reveals his homosexuality in Tony Kushner's landmark two-part
Angels in America (1994), received a Tony awards nomination for her performance as the headstrong young woman who falls for a mama's boy in
Indiscretions (Les Parents Terribles) (1996, her sixth Broadway show) and, though she originally lost the part to another actress, eventually took over the role of Lala Levy, the aspiring Scarlett O'Hara in the Tony Award-winning
The Last Night of Ballyhoo (1997).
Nixon was a founding member of the theatrical troupe The Drama Dept, which included Sarah Jessica Parker, Dylan Baker, John Cameron Mitchell and Billy Crudup among its actors, appearing in the group's productions of
Kingdom on Earth (1996),
June Moon and
As Bees in Honey Drown (both 1997),
Hope is the Thing with Feathers (1998), and
The Country Club (play) (1999).
Nixon has contributed supporting performances to
Addams Family Values (1993),
Marvin's Room (1996)
The Out-of-Towners (1999) and Baby's Day Out"
Stardom
She raised her profile significantly as one of the four regulars of HBO's successful comedy
Sex and the City (1998-2004), as the no-nonsense lawyer Miranda Hobbes in support of series star Sarah Jessica Parker. After Emmy nominations as Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actress - Comedy Series in 2002 and 2003, Nixon took home the trophy in 2004 for the series' final season.
The immense popularity of the series led Nixon to enjoy her first leading role in a feature, playing a video artist who falls in love, despite her best efforts to avoid commitment, with a bisexual actor who just happens to be dating a gay man (her best friend) in
Advice From a Caterpillar (2000), as well as starring opposite Scott Bakula in the holiday telepic
Papa's Angels (2000). In 2002 she also landed a stint as Mrs. Piggee in the independent film comedy
Igby Goes Down, and her turn in the theatrical production of Clare Booth Luce's play
The Women was captured for PBS's Stage On Screen series.
Post-Sex, Nixon did a guest stint on
ER (TV series) in 2005 as a mother who undergoes a tricky procedure to lessen the effects of a debilitating stroke. She followed up with a turn as Eleanor Roosevelt for HBO's
Warm Springs (film) (2005), which chronicled Franklin Delano Roosevelt's quest for a miracle cure for his paralytic illness. Nixon earned an Emmy nomination as Outstanding Lead Actress in a Miniseries or a Movie for her performance. She then had a 2005 stint on the Fox hit series
House (TV series) as a patient who suffers a seizure and matches wits with Dr. House (Hugh Laurie).
In 2006, Nixon won the Tony Award for Best Actress in a Leading Role (Play) for David Lindsay-Abaire's Pulitzer Prize-winning drama
Rabbit Hole. In 2008, she revived her role as Miranda Hobbes in
Sex and the City (film) feature film, directed by HBO executive producer Michael Patrick King and co-starring the cast of the original series.
Personal life
Nixon has two children, daughter Samantha (b. 1996) and son Charles Ezekiel (b. 2002), with Danny Mozes, an English literature professor, with whom she had a relationship from 1988 to 2003.
Nixon began dating education activist Christine Marinoni in January 2004; media reports of the relationship started surfacing in September of the same year. In February 2005, the
New York Post and other sources reported that Nixon had moved to Brooklyn to live with Marinoni. However, Nixon told the
The New York Times in January 2006 that she had not moved and that keeping her kids in their Manhattan public schools took priority. Discussing her relationship in an interview in
New York Magazine in 2006, Nixon stated that she never felt any struggle with her sexuality: "I never felt like there was an unconscious part of me around that woke up or that came out of the closet; there wasn't a struggle, there wasn't an attempt to suppress. I met this woman, I fell in love with her, and I'm a public figure." In an interview in May 2007, she said "In terms of sexual orientation I don’t really feel I’ve changed... I’d been with men all my life, and I’d never fallen in love with a woman. But when I did, it didn’t seem so strange. I’m just a woman in love with another woman." In April 2008, she received an award from the Point Foundation, which provides scholarships to gay students in the U.S., for being a role model for young gay people.
In an interview with
Good Morning America that aired on April 15, 2008, Cynthia Nixon announced for the first time that she battled breast cancer, after being diagnosed during a routine mammogram in October, 2006. Initially she did not go public because of the stigma involved, but since then, she not only has openly admitted that she had cancer, she has become a breast cancer activist and was able to convince the head of NBC to air her breast cancer special in primetime.
Cynthia Nixon in the news
Backing her kid’s school, actress Cynthia Nixon joins UWS war - Got...
Backing her kid’s school, actress Cynthia Nixon joins UWS warGothamSchools, NY - Nov 14, 2008by Philissa Cramer A resolution to move an Upper West Side middle school passed on Wednesday night, but not before Cynthia Nixon — “Sex and the City” ...
read moreCynthia Nixon Gets Out The Vote And Fights Gay-Marriage Ban In Flor...
MTV.comCynthia Nixon Gets Out The Vote And Fights Gay-Marriage Ban In FloridaMTV.com - Nov 4, 2008By Jocelyn Vena “Sex and the City” star and real-life New Yorker Cynthia Nixon made her way to Florida for this Election Day. Florida Street Teamer Anthony ...
read more“Californication’s” Evan Handler has a memoir out. - Los Angeles Times
Los Angeles Times“Californication’s” Evan Handler has a memoir out.Los Angeles Times, CA - 3 hours agoShe was a writer on "Sex and the City" who had "overheard a conversation between Sarah Jessica Parker and Cynthia Nixon, both of whom I'd known slightly ...
read moreCynthia Nixon's "Survival And The City" -...
CBS NewsCynthia Nixon's "Survival And The City"CBS News, NY - Oct 29, 2008The "Sex And The City" Star & Susan G. Komen Foundation Ambassador Discusses Her Battle With Breast Cancer "Sex and the City" star Cynthia Nixon is a breast ...
read moreThe Afternoon Wrap: Thursday - New York Observer
The Afternoon Wrap: ThursdayNew York Observer, NY - Nov 20, 2008[NY Times] As the city rezones portions of an UWS school district, a battle brews over “de facto segregation"... and Cynthia Nixon is involved. ...
read moreCynthia Nixon talks to students about voting against Amendment 2 - ...
Cynthia Nixon talks to students about voting against Amendment 2AfterEllen.com - Nov 4, 2008Out actress Cynthia Nixon was on the campus of the University of Miami, urging student voters to vote no on the amendment, and spoke to MTV News about why ...
read moreCynthia Nixon in Broadway play - Metro
MetroCynthia Nixon in Broadway playMetro, UK - Nov 7, 2008Sex And The City star Cynthia Nixon is taking part in a Broadway production of All About Eve. The actress will tread the boards in New York as part of a ...
read more'Sex in the City's' Cynthia Nixon to get ou...
Examiner.com'Sex in the City's' Cynthia Nixon to get out the vote tonight on ...Examiner.com - Nov 3, 2008by Drew Wilson, Denver Gay Examiner Former George W. Bush Press Secretary and Obama endorser Scott McClellan as well as Sex and the City star Cynthia Nixon ...
read moreRedrawing of West Side School Zones Stirs Furor - New York Times Blogs
New York Times BlogsRedrawing of West Side School Zones Stirs FurorNew York Times Blogs, NY - Nov 20, 2008Cynthia Nixon, the “Sex in the City” actress, whose daughter is in seventh grade at Center School, has lent her voice to the battle in recent days. ...Despite a rally and walkout, UWS parent council votes to rezone GothamSchoolsall 2 news articles
read moreDOE Plan To Relocate UWS School Has Parents Enraged - NY1
NY1DOE Plan To Relocate UWS School Has Parents EnragedNY1, NY - Nov 13, 2008But actor Cynthia Nixon, another Center School parent, worries about how a move would affect her daughter. "If the Center School gets moved next year ...
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