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Madeleine Stowe

Madeleine Stowe (born August 18, 1958) is an American actress.

Biography

Early life

Stowe, the eldest of three sisters, was born Madeline Mora Stowe in Eagle Rock, a working class suburb of Los Angeles, California. Her mother, Mireya (née Mora), immigrated from Costa Rica and came from a prominent family, and her father, Robert Stowe, a civil engineer, was a native of Oregon. Stowe's father suffered from multiple sclerosis.

At the age of ten, Stowe began taking piano lessons with the aim of becoming a concert pianist — and also as a way of not having to socialize with other kids. Her Russian-born music teacher Sergei Tarnowsky (he taught Vladimir Horowitz before immigrating to the US), had faith in her, teaching her from his deathbed. But when he died at the age of 96, she quit ("I just felt it was time to not be by myself anymore") — and at 18 she went on her first date. She then studied cinema and journalism at the University of Southern California. Not overly interested in her classes, Stowe volunteered to do performances at the Solaris, a Beverly Hills theater, where a movie agent saw her in a play, and subsequently got her several offers of appearances in TV and films.

Career

For nearly fifteen years Stowe appeared mostly in minor or supporting roles in movies and on TV. A few of her performances from this period became, however, well-known to the public, as was the case for Stakeout (1987), where she played opposite Richard Dreyfuss, and Revenge, (1990), which co-starred Kevin Costner. In 1992 Stowe finally landed a leading role in a high-profile film, The Last of the Mohicans, which also starred Daniel Day-Lewis.

Thereafter, several major film roles followed. The next year, director Robert Altman cast Stowe in Short Cuts, in which she gave one of her most acclaimed screen performances as the wife of a compulsive lying and adulterous police officer played by Tim Robbins. The following year, Madeleine was a blind musician in the thriller Blink, co-starring Aidan Quinn (14 years earlier, she had a guest role as a blind painter in Little House on the Prairie). The year after that, she was a sympathetic psychiatrist in the science-fiction movie Twelve Monkeys. Stowe postponed her acting career in 1996 in order to concentrate on motherhood. In 1998 she came back with The Proposition. She most recently appeared in the Jeff Goldblum Detective Drama Raines on NBC for the 2007 mid-season replacement. The series was canceled two months later.

Personal life

Stowe has been married to actor Brian Benben since 1982, after meeting when they acted in a TV film the previous year. The couple have a daughter, May (born 1996), and spend spare time on the ranch they own in Texas.

In December 2007, she endorsed and campaigned for John Edwards in the U.S. presidential election, 2008.

Filmography

Film
Year	Film	Role	Other notes
1981	Gangster Wars	Ruth Lasker
1987	Stakeout	Maria McGuire
1989	Tropical Snow	Marina
1989	Worth Winning	Veronica Briskow
1990	Revenge	Miryea Mendez
1990	The Two Jakes	Lillian Bodine
1991	Closet Land	Victim
1992	Unlawful Entry	Karen Carr
1992	The Last of the Mohicans	Cora Munro
1993	Another Stakeout	Maria	Uncredited Role
1993	Short Cuts	Sherri Shepard
1994	Blink	Emma Brody
	China Moon	Rachel Munro
	Bad Girls	Cody Zamora
1995	Twelve Monkeys	Kathryn Railly
1998	The Proposition	Eleanor Barret
1998	Playing by Heart	Gracie
1999	The General's Daughter	Warr. Off. Sara Sunhill
2002	Impostor	Maya Olham
	We Were Soldiers	Julie Moore
	Avenging Angelo	Jennifer Barrett Allieghieri
2003	Octane	Senga Wilson
Television
Year	Title	Role	Notes
1978	Baretta	Anna	Episode: The Marker
	The Amazing Spider-Man	Maria Calderon	Episode: Escort to Danger
	The Nativity	Mary	ABC TV-Movie
	The Deerslayer	Hetty Hutter	NBC TV-Movie
1979	Barnaby Jones	Diane	Episode: School of Terror
1980	Beulah Land	Selma Kendrick Davis	CBS Miniseries
1980	Little House on the Prairie	Annie Crane	Episode: Portrait of Love
1981	Trapper John, M.D.	Cassie	Episode: Creepy Time Gal
1981	The Gangster Chronicles	Ruth Lasker	NBC Miniseries
1984	Amazons	Dr. Sharon Fields	ABC TV-Movie
1986	Blood & Orchids	Hester Ashley Murdoch	CBS TV-Movie
2002	The Magnificent Ambersons	Isabel Amberson Minafer	A&E Network TV-Movie
2005	Saving Milly	Milly	CBS TV-Movie
2006	Southern Comfort	Charlotte	Unsold TV-Pilot
2007	Raines	Dr. Samantha Kohl