Lois Smith

Lois Smith

Birth : 1930-11-03, Topeka, Kansas, USA

History

Lois Arlene Smith (née Humbert; born November 3, 1930) is an American actress. She made her film debut in the 1955 drama film East of Eden, and later played supporting roles in a number of movies, including Five Easy Pieces (1970), Resurrection (1980), Fatal Attraction (1987), Fried Green Tomatoes (1991), How to Make an American Quilt (1995), Dead Man Walking, Twister (1996), Minority Report (2002), The Nice Guys (2016) and Lady Bird (2017). In 2017, Smith received critical acclaim for her leading performance in the science-fiction drama film Marjorie Prime, for which she was nominated for an Independent Spirit Awards, Gotham Awards and Saturn Award, and well as won Satellite Award. Smith also has had many roles on television, both daytime and prime time. She was regular cast member in the HBO horror drama True Blood, and well as received Critics' Choice Television Award for Best Guest Performer in a Drama Series nomination for The Americans. Smith also is known for her extensive work in the theatre, receiving two Tony Award nominations for originating the role of Ma Joad in The Grapes of Wrath (1990) and for the role of Halie in a revival of Buried Child in 1996. She also starred in an acclaimed Off-Broadway revival of The Trip to Bountiful in 2005 for which she received an Obie Award for Best Actress, an Outer Critics Circle Award, a Lucille Lortel Award, and a Drama Desk Award. Smith is an ensemble member of Steppenwolf Theatre Company in Chicago. Description above from the Wikipedia article Lois Smith, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.

Profile

Lois Smith
Lois Smith

Movies

The Uninvited
A stranger crashes a party, sparking a comedy of errors, and a reordering of life.
Mack & Rita
Betty
A 30-year-old spends a wild weekend in Palm Springs and wakes up to find she has magically transformed into her 70-year-old self.
The French Dispatch
Upshur 'Maw' Clampette
The staff of an American magazine based in France puts out its last issue, with stories featuring an artist sentenced to life imprisonment, student riots, and a kidnapping resolved by a chef.
Uncle Frank
Aunt Butch
In 1973, when Frank Bledsoe and his 18-year-old niece Beth take a road trip from Manhattan to Creekville, South Carolina for the family patriarch's funeral, they're unexpectedly joined by Frank's lover Walid.
The Great Work Begins: Scenes from Angels in America
Harper Pitt
An all-star livestream benefit performance of scenes from Angels in America in support of amfAR’s Fund to Fight COVID-19.
Tesla
The Grande Dame
The story of the Promethean struggles of Nikola Tesla, as he attempts to transcend entrenched technology—including his own previous work—by pioneering a system of wireless energy that would change the world.
Lady Bird
Sister Sarah Joan
Lady Bird McPherson, a strong willed, deeply opinionated, artistic 17 year old comes of age in Sacramento. Her relationship with her mother and her upbringing are questioned and tested as she plans to head off to college.
Marjorie Prime
Marjorie
A service which creates holographic projections of late family members allows an elderly woman to spend time with a younger version of her deceased husband.
The Comedian
Miriam
An aging comic icon, Jackie Burke, has seen better days. Despite his efforts to reinvent himself and his comic genius, the audience only wants to know him as the former television character he once played. Already a strain on his younger brother and his wife, Jackie is forced to serve out a sentence doing community service for accosting an audience member. While there, he meets Harmony, the daughter of a sleazy Florida real estate mogul, and the two find inspiration in one another, resulting in surprising consequences.
The Nice Guys
Mrs. Glenn
A private eye investigates the apparent suicide of a fading porn star in 1970s Los Angeles and uncovers a conspiracy.
Run All Night
Margaret Conlon
Brooklyn mobster and prolific hit man Jimmy Conlon has seen better days. Longtime best friend of a mob boss, Jimmy is haunted by the sins of his past—as well as a dogged police detective who’s been one step behind Jimmy for 30 years. But when Jimmy’s estranged son becomes a target, Jimmy must make a choice between the crime family he chose and the real family he abandoned long ago. Now, with nowhere safe to turn, Jimmy has just one night to figure out exactly where his loyalties lie and to see if he can finally make things right.
The Gettysburg Address
Elizabeth Crawford (voice)
In the midst of the Civil War, President Lincoln went to Gettysburg. "The Gettysburg Address" investigates the five extant copies of Lincoln's famous speech, separating fact from fiction along the way. Lincoln's greater journey to Gettysburg is chronicled, from his early anti-slavery sentiments as a poor farmer's son to his rousing orations as one of America's greatest leaders.
Showing Up
Self
An unprecedented look at the audition, compiled from more than 50 interviews with notable artists including Kristin Chenoweth, Richard Griffiths, Zoe Kazan, Nathan Lane, Chris Messina, Sam Rockwell and Eli Wallach.
The Man Who Came Out Only at Night
The Youngest Daughter (later)
In this retelling of an Italian folktale, a man marries the youngest of three sisters and shares a very strange secret with her on their wedding night.
The Odd Life of Timothy Green
Aunt Mel
A childless couple bury a box in their backyard, containing all of their wishes for an infant. Soon, a child is born, though Timothy Green is not all that he appears.
Roadie
Mom
After 20 years on the road with Blue Oyster Cult, Jimmy Testagros returns to his hometown to life with his ailing mother. Complications arise when he falls for an old friend, who is now married to his longtime nemesis.
Please Give
Mrs. Portman
In New York City, a husband and wife butt heads with the granddaughters of the elderly woman who lives in the apartment the couple owns.
A Dog Year
Lois Blair
Jon Katz is close to burnout. He's a writer with writer's block; his wife has left for her sister's because he's emotionally distant; he rarely answers his phone. A kennel sends him a border collie that's undisciplined because of abuse. Despite a series of mishaps, Jon decides to keep trying with the dog, and he rents a dilapidated farm house to give the dog room to run. A local handyman refers Jon to a woman who might be able to help him train the dog. Reluctantly, Jon gives her a try. Is the dog the problem, or the owner?
Turn the River
Abby
A pool shark takes the ultimate gamble when she kidnaps her own son and flees her ex-husband.
Griffin & Phoenix
Dr. Imberman
A terminally ill man falls in love with a woman who has a secret that threatens their time spent together.
Hollywoodland
Helen Bessolo
When Hollywood superstar George Reeves dies in his home, private detective Louis Simo is hired to investigate his death and gets caught in a web of lies involving a big studio executive's wife.
Little Fugitive
Elizabeth
Set in present day Brooklyn, this film is a remake of the 1953 classic, "Little Fugitive." With his father in jail and his mother working long hours at a nursing home, Lenny, age 11, is burdened with the responsibility of looking after his younger brother, Joey, age 7. Lenny plays a practical joke on his little brother. When the joke goes too far, Joey runs away to Coney Island.
Sweet Land
Inge (as an older woman)
Set in 1920, Inge travels from Germany to rural Minnesota in order to meet the man destined to be her husband.
P.S.
Ellie Silverstein
Louise, an unfulfilled divorced woman with regrets, gets the chance to relive her past when she meets a young man who bears an uncanny resemblance, in name and appearance, to her high school sweetheart who died many years before.
Iron Jawed Angels
Reverend Anna Howard Shaw
Defiant young activists take the women's suffrage movement by storm, putting their lives at risk to help American women win the right to vote.
The Best Thief In The World
Helen
Izzy, the youngest son of a troubled New York family, takes a shine to breaking into people's apartments as a way to get attention.
Red Betsy
Helen Rounds
A close-knit Midwestern farm family deals with loss, change, and social progress during the 1940's.
Minority Report
Dr. Iris Hineman
John Anderton is a top 'Precrime' cop in the late-21st century, when technology can predict crimes before they're committed. But Anderton becomes the quarry when another investigator targets him for a murder charge.
The Laramie Project
Lucy Thompson
"The Laramie Project" is set in and around Laramie, Wyoming, in the aftermath of the murder of 21-year-old Matthew Shepard. To create the stage version of "The Laramie Project," the eight-member New York-based Tectonic Theatre Project traveled to Laramie, Wyoming, recording hours of interviews with the town's citizens over a two-year period. The film adaptation dramatizes the troupe's visit, using the actual words from the transcripts to create a portrait of a town forced to confront itself.
The Pledge
Helen Jackson
A police chief about to retire pledges to help a woman find her daughter's killer.
Powder Keg
Mother
The Driver is drafted by the UN to rescue a wounded war photographer named Harvey Jacobs from out of hostile territory. While they are leaving Jacobs tells the Driver about the horrors he saw as a photographer, but he regrets his inability to help war victims. Jacobs answers the driver curiosity about why he is a photographer by saying how his mother taught him to see. He gives the Driver the film needed for a New York Times story and also his dog tags to give to his mother. When they reach the border, they are confronted by a guard who begins to draw arms as Jacobs begins taking pictures, trying to get himself killed. The Driver drives through a hail of gunfire to the border, but finds Jacobs killed by a bullet through the seat. The Driver arrives in America to visit Jacobs' mother and share the news of him winning the Pulitzer prize and hand over the dog tags, only to discover that she is blind.
Tumbleweeds
Ginger
Whenever trouble strikes in one of her relationships, single mother Mary Jo Walker and her daughter, Ava, pack up and move to another city, a routine Ava is tiring of. This time, they are helped on their move to San Diego by trucker Jack Ranson. While Ava settles in, getting a leading part in the school play, Jack starts dating Mary Jo but soon reveals himself to be controlling and aggressive. Mary Jo prepares to flee again, angering Ava.
The Eternal
Mrs. Ferriter
An alcoholic American couple travel to the UK with their son so he can meet his grandmother but they walk in on their crazed uncle who is in the midst of reviving a centuries-old Druid witch.
Hudson River  Blues
Hoping to help their marriage, a Manhattan lawyer (Rya Kihlstedt) brings her burned-out husband (Robert Stanton) to her mother's home upstate.
Twister
Meg Greene
An unprecedented series of violent tornadoes is sweeping across Oklahoma. Tornado chasers, headed by Dr. Jo Harding, attempt to release a groundbreaking device that will allow them to track them and create a more advanced warning system. They are joined by Jo's soon to be ex-husband Bill, a former tornado chaser himself, and his girlfriend Melissa.
Dead Man Walking
Helen's Mother
A death row inmate turns for spiritual guidance to a local nun in the days leading up to his scheduled execution for the murders of a young couple.
How to Make an American Quilt
Sophia
Soon-to-be-wed graduate student Finn Dodd develops cold feet when she suspects her fiancé is cheating on her. In order to clear her head, Finn visits her grandmother, Hy, and great aunt, Glady Joe Cleary, in Grasse, Calif. There, Finn learns that Hy and Glady Joe are members of a group of passionate quilters, and over the course of her visit she is regaled with tales of love and life by women who have collected rich experiences and much wisdom.
Truman
Madge Wallace Gates
Biographical account of America's President for the latter part of WWII. Shows Truman's rise from small-town nobody to leader of the USA, his decision to use the Atomic Bomb against Japan, and subsequent election as the US' post-war President.
Holy Matrimony
Orna
A young Hutterite boy must marry his late brother's wife who comes from outside the community.
Falling Down
D-Fens' Mother
An ordinary man frustrated with the various flaws he sees in society begins to psychotically and violently lash out against them.
Skylark
Lou Wheaton
Jacob's farm is in trouble from a severe drought. Jacob and Sarah begin to wonder if Sarah can stay, and what will happen to Jacob if she and the children have to leave the farm.
Jack Reed: Deadly Matrimony
Alan Masters is a despicable businessman with his hands in organized crime. He marries Diane, a kind and gentle woman, and abuses and batters her viciously. Sergeant John Reed has had enough of his city's organized crime and, against the wishes of his dirty-cop superiors, tries to get evidence against Alan Masters. After Alan finds out that Diane has been helping Reed, he beats her to death...and its up to John Reed to put him away for it, and clean up the dirty cops that want to stop him. Part I starts with Diane's death and then, in a flashback, details her struggles against abuse and Reed's struggles as he coaches her to gather evidence against Alan. Part II deals with Reed's struggles with intimidating cops.
Keep the Change
Lureen
A struggling artist visits his family on their Montana ranch and finds that his former flame, daughter of a family foe, is now married to an old friend.
Hard Promises
Mrs. Bell
A man who doesn't like stable work environments has been away for too many years, and finds out his wife has divorced him and is planning to remarry. He comes home to confront her, trying to convince her not to get married, aided by the daughter, who loves him despite his wandering ways. The couple finds out they still have feelings for each other but must decide how best to handle the contradiction of their lifestyles.
Fried Green Tomatoes
Mama Threadgoode
Amidst her own personality crisis, southern housewife Evelyn Couch meets Ninny, an outgoing old woman who tells her the story of Idgie Threadgoode and Ruth Jamison, two young women who experienced hardships and love in Whistle Stop, Alabama in the 1920s.
White Hot: The Mysterious Murder of Thelma Todd
Alice Todd
When '30s film star Thelma Todd dies mysteriously, her relationship with New York mobster Lucky Luciano is investigated.
Switched at Birth
Margaret
This is the story of the two babies who were switched at birth. A few years later when one of the girls gets sick and tests revealed that she was not the daughter of the couple who raised her. Eventually she dies. And the couple most especially the mother, search for their real daughter. Eventually they suspect that it's a widower who has their child. Now while they try to find out if she is their daughter, the widower is advised by his attorney not to be so hasty to cooperate, cause if she is their daughter, he might lose her, and she is all he has.
The Grapes of Wrath
Ma Joad
A stage presentation of John Steinbeck's "The Grapes of Wrath". The Steppenwolf Theater Company's production featuring the original Broadway cast. Desperately proud, but reduced to poverty by the loss of their farm, the Joads pile their few possessions on a battered old truck and head west for California, hoping to find work and a better life. Led by the indomitable Ma Joad, who is determined to keep the family together at any cost, and by the volatile young Tom Joad, an ex-convict who grows increasingly impatient with the intolerance and exploitation that they encounter on their trek, the Joads must deal with death and terrible deprivation before reaching their destination—where their waning hopes are dealt a final blow by the stark realities of the Great Depression.
Green Card
Brontë's Mother
Urban horticulturalist Brontë Mitchell has her eye on a gorgeous apartment, but the building's board will rent it only to a married couple. Georges Fauré, a waiter from France whose visa is expiring, needs to marry an American woman to stay in the country. Their marriage of convenience turns into a burden when they must live together to allay the suspicions of the immigration service, as the polar opposites grate on each other's nerves.
Midnight Run
Mrs. Nelson
An accountant embezzles $15 million of mob money, jumps bail and is chased by bounty hunters, the FBI, and the Mafia.
Fatal Attraction
Martha
For Dan Gallagher, life is good. He is on the rise at his New York law firm, is happily married to his wife, Beth, and has a loving daughter. But, after a casual fling with a sultry book editor named Alex, everything changes. Jilted by Dan, Alex becomes unstable, her behavior escalating from aggressive pursuit to obsessive stalking. Dan realizes that his main problem is not hiding his affair, but rather saving himself and his family.
Black Widow
Sara
Federal agent Alexandra Barnes believes that Catherine Petersen is a serial killer who marries rich men and then murders them for their money. But since Catherine is seemingly a master of disguise and has multiple identities, Alexandra can't prove anything with conventional detective work. With no other option, she goes undercover, pursuing the same man as Catherine, and hoping that Catherine will slip up and reveal her true identity.
Twisted
Helen Giles
One evening the Collins find their maid Mrs. Murdock at the end of their steps: dead, neck broken. Obviously she had an accident. Consequently they need a new babysitter for an upcoming big party. The sensible Helen meets little Susan Collins at the discount market and likes her, so she offers to do the job. She doesn't know Susan's teenage brother Mark - technically skilled and good in school, but restive and cunning. As soon as the parents have left, he starts psychologically terrorizing Helen and his sister with electronic tricks.
The Execution of Raymond Graham
Mary Neal
A young man, convicted of the murder of a clerk, who has been on death row for five years and now awaits his execution while his family desperately seek a reprieve.
Reckless
Mrs. Prescott
Rebellious footballer Johnny, falls for cheerleader Tracy. They come from opposite backgrounds; she's from a comfortable well off family, he is poor and broken. Tracy already has a boyfriend but he acts like a jerk, so Johnny has to win Tracy's heart - something she seems reluctant to let him do.
Reuben, Reuben
Mare Spofford
A drunken Scottish poet who has not written a word in years feels compelled to regain control of his life and work after meeting a beautiful young woman.
Four Friends
Mrs. Carnahan
A young immigrant comes to America in the 60s and is caught up in the counterculture movement which tests his bonds of friendship and love.
The House of Mirth
Bertha Dorset
Lily Bart, a well-born, but penniless woman of the high society of New York City, who was raised and educated to become wife to a rich man. As an unmarried woman with gambling debts and an uncertain future, Lily is destroyed by the society who created her...
Resurrection
Kathy
The story of a woman who survives the car accident which kills her husband, but discovers that she has the power to heal other people. She becomes an unwitting celebrity, the hope of those in desperate need of healing, and a lightning rod for religious beliefs and skeptics.
Foxes
Mrs. Axman
A group of friends come of age in the asphalt desert of the San Fernando Valley, as set to a blazing soundtrack and endless drinking, drugs and sex.
The Jilting of Granny Weatherall
Cornelia
Granny Weatherall (Geraldine Fitzgerald) is a spunky old lady of eighty who bosses around her doctor and her children. She seems so strong and in control, and yet she has never had the upper hand in her destiny. One morning, a flood of long-forgotten memories bring her to the realization that of all her accomplishments, she cannot console herself for the shame-filled day she was left standing at the alter. Still, her indomitable will to live and act independently infuses the last day of her life. Adapted from the short story by acclaimed writer Katherine Anne Porter ("Ship of Fools"), The Jilting of Granny Weatherall reminds us of the plight of many women who wait for life to claim them, rather than seek life out for themselves.
Next Stop, Greenwich Village
Anita Cunningham
An aspiring Jewish actor moves out of his parents' Brooklyn apartment to seek his fortune in the bohemian life of Greenwich Village in 1953.
Up the Sandbox
Elinore
A young wife and mother, bored with day-to-day life in New York City and neglected by her husband, slips into increasingly outrageous fantasies: her mother breaking into the apartment, an explorer's demonstration of tribal fertility music at a party causing strange transformations, and joining terrorists to plant explosives in the Statue of Liberty.
Particular Men
A fictitious but powerful look at the dawn of the nuclear age, this stage performance follows several government scientists as they develop the atomic bomb, grapple with the morality of their work, and confront major problems with their superiors. Written by award-winning playwright Loring Mandel, this riveting production stars Stacy Keach, Alice Drummond, Lois Smith, Clifton James and Verna Bloom.
Five Easy Pieces
Partita Dupea
A drop-out from upper-class America picks up work along the way on oil-rigs when his life isn't spent in a squalid succession of bars, motels, and other points of interest.
The Way We Live Now
Jane Aldridge
A mid-life crisis propels a disaffected advertising executive out of his marriage and into a series of disastrous love affairs with a series of women. He will eventually return to his wife, chastened.
Dragon Country
TV movie containing filmed versions of "I Can't Imagine Tomorrow" and "Talk to Me Like the Rain and Let Me Listen"
The Master Builder
Hilda
Famed playwright Henrik Ibsen tells the tale of a master builder in the twilight of his career who reaches for love in response to his work's demise.
Strange Lady in Town
Spurs O'Brien
There's a new doctor in old Santa Fe, and it's Greer Garson. Director Mervyn LeRoy's 1955 western also stars Dana Andrews, Cameron Mitchell, Lois Smith, Walter Hampden, Pedro Gonzales-Gonzales, Earl Holliman, Adele Jergens, Robert Wilke, Frank DeKova, Nick Adams, Douglas Kennedy, Ralph Moody and Louise Lorimer.
East of Eden
Anne
In the Salinas Valley in and around World War I, Cal Trask feels he must compete against overwhelming odds with his brother for the love of their father. Cal is frustrated at every turn, from his reaction to the war, how to get ahead in business and in life, and how to relate to his estranged mother.
The Steel Harp