| BIOGRAPHY
Actress, tabloid fodder, provocative Vanity Fair cover piece:
Demi Moore is nothing if not an unforgettable roadside attraction
on the pop culture highway. Rising to prominence with a string
of successful films during the '80s and early '90s, Moore became
known for both her onscreen and offscreen ability to draw attention
for everything from her grin-and-bare-it roles in films like Striptease
to her well-publicized marriage to her divorce from Bruce Willis.
Born Demetria Guynes in Roswell, NM, on November 11, 1962, Moore
led a troubled childhood. To call it tumultuous would be something
of an understatement: along with her mother, half-brother and
stepfather, she moved no less than 30 times before her adolescence,
thanks to her stepfather's job as a newspaper ad salesman.
The problems that went along with such an itinerant lifestyle
were compounded by the dysfunctional, sometimes abusive relationship
between Moore's mother and stepfather. The latter committed suicide
when Moore was 15, around the time that she discovered that he
was not her biological father. She dropped out of school a year
later and did some modeling in Europe. When she was 18, Moore
married rocker Freddy Moore; the union lasted four years, during
which time the actress landed her first role playing Jackie Templeton
on the TV daytime drama General Hospital.
Moore made her film debut in 1981, appearing in both the coming-of-age
drama Choices and the schlock-tastic Parasite. Following a bit
role in 1982's Young Doctors in Love, she had her first lead role
in No Small Affair (1984) as an aspiring rock singer opposite
Jon Cryer.
Her real breakthrough came the next year, when she starred as
an unstable member of a group of college friends in St. Elmo's
Fire. Apparently, her onscreen instability mirrored her offscreen
condition at the time; she was reportedly fired from the film
at one point and then rehired after going into drug rehab. The
film was a hit, and Moore, along with such co-stars as Emilio
Estevez (to whom she was engaged for three years), Rob Lowe, and
Ally Sheedy, became a member of the infamous "Brat Pack."
Fortunately for Moore, she managed to avoid the straight-to-oblivion
fate of other Brat Pack members, increasing her fame and resume
with films like About Last Night (1986) and The Seventh Sign (1988).
Her fame further increased in 1987 when she wed Bruce Willis
in a Las Vegas ceremony presided over by singer Little Richard.
In 1990, Moore had her biggest hit to date with Ghost, a romantic
drama that cast her as the grieving girlfriend of the deceased
Patrick Swayze. A huge success, Ghost secured Moore a place on
the A-list, something she managed to sustain despite the subsequent
twin flops of The Butcher's Wife and Mortal Thoughts, both released
in 1991.
That same year, Moore gained exposure of a different sort when
she appeared nude and hugely pregnant on the cover of Vanity Fair;
the resulting hoopla gained her more attention than either of
her movies that year.
She was back on the magazine's cover the following year, nude
again but fetus-free and sporting a layer of artfully applied
body paint. The controversy surrounding her cover-girl appearances
may have helped Moore weather similar flak around her next feature,
1993's Indecent Proposal. The story of a woman (Moore) who agrees
to a one-night stand with a wealthy man (Robert Redford) for one
million dollars after she and her husband (Woody Harrelson) find
themselves in dire financial straits, Proposal was decried by
a number of feminist groups as well as various film critics and
went on to be another big, if controversial, hit for Moore.
Following the commercial success of Indecent Proposal, Moore's
career hit something of a downward spiral. 1994's Disclosure proved
a disappointment, and the following year's Now and Then (which
she also produced) staged a similarly wan performance at the box
office; however, it was Moore's other film that year, a "free,"
or, as some would say, staggeringly misguided, adaptation of Nathaniel
Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter, that had critics howling and audiences
cowering like small children being forced to watch German expressionist
films. An unintentionally hilarious rendering of the classic tale,
it featured Moore's Hester Prynne exposing plenty of skin, luxuriating
in what must have been one of Puritan New England's few hot tubs,
having steamy sex on a shifting bed of grain, and walking off
into the sunset with her beloved Reverend Dimmesdale (a moody
Gary Oldman).
Following the disaster that was The Scarlet Letter, Moore took
refuge on safer grounds, lending her voice to Disney's animated
The Hunchback of Notre Dame in 1996; however, that same year,
she encountered another career pitfall in the form of Striptease.
Based on Carl Hiaasen's satirical novel about a divorcée
who turns to stripping so that she can raise money to win back
custody of her daughter, the film proved a failure, despite titillating
advertisements promising that Moore would bare all for audiences.
The actress' career suffered a further blow with the disappointment
of G.I. Jane in 1997, and she found herself getting more attention
for her offscreen life as she was, by that point, embroiled in
a very public divorce from Willis. The two formally separated
in 1998.
Although her career in front of the camera has suffered, Moore
has managed to do well for herself as a producer. In 1997, she
produced the hugely successful Austin Powers: International Man
of Mystery and served in the same capacity for its mega-hit sequels,
1999's Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me and 2002's Austin
Powers in Goldmember.
In 2000, Moore returned to the screen to star in Alain Berliner's
Passion of Mind, a psychological drama that cast the actress in
a dual role as two women who lead different lives but are tied
by a single identity.
The year 2003 brought Moore back to the spotlight in a big way
-- not only did the 41-year-old actress play the shockingly buff-bodied
bad guy in Charlie's Angels: Full Throttle, she gave the paparazzi
something of a godsend by dating Punk'd wunderkind Ashton Kutcher.
|
FILMOGRAPHY
• Charlie's Angels: Full Throttle (2003)
• Passion of Mind (2000)
• Deconstructing Harry (1997)
• Destination Anywhere (1997)
• G.I. Jane (1997)
• If These Walls Could Talk (1996)
• The Juror (1996)
• Striptease (1996)
• Now and Then (1995)
• The Scarlet Letter (1995)
• Disclosure (1994)
• Indecent Proposal (1993)
• A Few Good Men (1992)
• The Butcher's Wife (1991)
• Master Ninja (1991)
• Mortal Thoughts (1991)
• Nothing But Trouble (1991)
• Ghost (1990)
• We're No Angels (1989)
• The Seventh Sign (1988)
• Wisdom (1987)
• About Last Night... (1986)
• One Crazy Summer (1986)
• St. Elmo's Fire (1985)
• Blame It on Rio (1984)
• No Small Affair (1984)
• Choices (1982)
• Parasite (1982)
• Young Doctors in Love (1982) |
