Catherine O'Hara

Catherine Anne O'Hara (born March 4, 1954) is a Canadian-American Emmy and Gemini Award-winning actress and comedienne. She is well known for her comedy work on SCTV and for her film roles as Delia Deetz in Beetlejuice, Kate McCallister in Home Alone, Sally in The Nightmare Before Christmas and the series of mockumentary films written and directed by Christopher Guest.

Biography

O'Hara was born and raised in Toronto, Ontario to a large Irish Catholic family. She started her acting career in 1974 as a cast member of The Second City in Toronto . She was an understudy for Gilda Radner until she left for Saturday Night Live. Two years later, this theatre troupe created the television series SCTV, on which she became a regular performer. Memorable O'Hara characterizations on the show included Las Vegas scorcher (I wanna bear your children!) Lola Heatherton, buzzer-happy game show contestant Margaret Meehan, raunchy nightclub comedian Dusty Towne, soap opera seductress Sue Ellen and stage actress Sue Bopper Simpson.

In the late 1970s, she did various voice-overs for a number of cartoons, which would continue throughout her career. During a short time in the early 80's when SCTV was in between network deals, she was hired to replace Ann Risley when Saturday Night Live was being retooled in 1981. However, she quit the show without ever having made an appearance on it, choosing to go back to SCTV when the show signed on with NBC and was back on the air. Her SNL position was then given to fellow Canadian Robin Duke, who had also replaced O'Hara for a season on SCTV.

She had roles in many films over the years, including Martin Scorsese's After Hours in 1985, as well as parts in two Tim Burton films, Beetlejuice and The Nightmare Before Christmas. She played Kate McCallister in the first two Home Alone films. In 1999 she did a voice over for Ludmilla, the main antagonist in "Bartok the Magnificent". In 2006, she starred in her fourth Christopher Guest film, For Your Consideration (following Waiting for Guffman, Best in Show, and A Mighty Wind).

On June 9, 2007, she was inducted into Canada's Walk of Fame. In May 2008, it was announced that she has signed on to star in the upcoming ABC dramedy Good Behavior.

Personal life

A naturalized U.S. citizen,, she married production designer/director Bo Welch in 1992 and has two sons, Matthew (b.1994) and Luke (b.1997). She is the sister of critically-acclaimed singer-songwriter Mary Margaret O'Hara, though she is a singer-songwriter in her own right, having written and performed songs in the 2003 film A Mighty Wind. She has a condition known as Dextrocardia with situs inversus.

Filmography

Celebrities impersonated by O'Hara on SCTV

• Liv Ullmann
• Katharine Hepburn
• Diane Keaton
• Joey Heatherton
• Lola Falana
• Elizabeth Taylor
• Brooke Shields
• Morgan Fairchild
• Barbara Billingsley
• Phyllis George

• Charlotte Rampling
• Monica Vitti
• Jane Pauley
• Rona Barrett
• Tammy Faye Bakker
• Angie Dickinson
• Dorothy Kilgallen
• Jessica Savitch
• Linda Blair
• Judith Crist

• Rusty Warren
• Gilda Radner
• Joan Sutherland,
• Jane Fonda
• Joan Embry
• Candice Bergen
• Meryl Streep
• Karen Black
• Lucille Ball

Films

Year	Film title	Character or Role
1983	Rock & Rule	Aunt Edith
1985	After Hours	Gail
1986	Heartburn	Betty
1988	Beetlejuice	Delia Deetz
1990	Home Alone	Kate McCallister
1990	Betsy's Wedding	Gloria Henner
1990	Dick Tracy	Texie Garcia
1990	Little Vegas	Lexie
1992	Home Alone 2: Lost in New York	Kate McCallister
1992	There Goes the Neighborhood	Jessie Lodge
1993	The Nightmare Before Christmas	Sally and Shock (both speaking and singing)
1994	Little Giants	Young Boy's Mother
1994	A Simple Twist of Fate	Mrs. Simon
1994	Wyatt Earp	Allie Earp
1994	The Paper	Susan
1995	Tall Tale	Calamity Jane
1996	The Last of the High Kings	Cathleen
1996	Waiting for Guffman	Sheila Albertson
1997	Hope (TV)	Muriel Macswain
1997	Pippi Longstocking	voice of Mrs. Prysselius
1999	Late Last Night (TV)	the Shrink
1998	Home Fries	Mrs. Lever
1999	Bartok the Magnificent	voice of Ludmilla
1999	The Life Before This	Sheena
2000	Edwurd Fudwupper Fibbed Big	voice
2000	Best in Show	Cookie Guggelman Fleck
2001	Speaking of Sex	Connie Barker
2001	Committed (TV Series)
2002	Orange County	Cindy Beugler
2003	A Mighty Wind	Mickey Crabbe
2004	Surviving Christmas	Christine Valco
2004	The Wool Cap	Gloria
2004	Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events	Justice Strauss
2005	Chicken Little	Tina
2006	For Your Consideration	Marilyn Hack
2006	Monster House	DJ's Mother
2006	Brother Bear 2	Kata
2006	Over The Hedge	Penny
2008	Penelope	Jessica Wilhern
2009	Farlanders	TBA
2009	Where the Wild Things Are	Judith

References

External links

• Catherine O'Hara at the Internet Movie Database