Occupation: Actress, Producer
Date of Birth: March 10, 1958
Place of Birth: Meadville, Pa., USA
Sign: Sun in Pisces, Moon in Sagittarius
Relations:Husband: Phil Bronstein (newspaper editor); ex-husband: Michael Greenburg (producer); father: Joseph Stone (factory worker); mother: Dorothy Stone (homemaker); siblings: Michael (actor), Kelly (executive producer), Patrick
Education: Attended Edinboro State University
THIS FORMER BEAUTY pageant contestant and Ford model made her film debut with a non-speaking part as a beautiful woman fleetingly glimpsed from a moving train in Woody Allen's Stardust Memories (1980). Thereaafter, she clawed her way to a stardom that has brought back an old-fashioned, high-octane glamour to the role of "movie star." Stone, who grew up a bookworm in a large family in Northwest Pennsylvania, worked her way up from McDonald's counter-girl to successful Ford model (both in print ads and TV commercials) by the late 1970s.
Through the 1980s, Stone appeared as a stereotypical blonde in mostly
forgettable roles.
Stone also struggled in TV, beginning with a tiny part in "Not Just Another
Affair" (CBS, 1982) and moving on to other series, most of them short-lived. Stone's first real break was playing Arnold Schwarzenegger's kick-boxing, secret agent "wife" in Paul Verhoeven's sci-fi actioner Total Recall (1990). After five more forgettable thrillers and comedies, she finally achieved the proverbial "overnight" stardom as a sexually voracious crime writer opposite Michael Douglas in Verhoeven's controversial and popular erotic thriller, Basic Instinct (1992).
Her pantie-less leg-crossing scene brought Stone much-needed notoriety,
but has haunted her ever since.
Currently, the actress is working on the sequal to the movie.
In a more conventionally sympathetic role, Stone followed up with another
sizzling sex melodrama, Sliver (1993), which did middling business stateside but proved a solid success overseas. Trying to escape the sex-bomb trap, she begged for the frigid wife role in Intersection (1994), which met with limited success.
She again flexed her international box-office clout and paired with Sylvester
Stallone in the explosive actioner The Specialist (1994). She fared much less
well commercially in her next project, The Quick and the Dead (1995), which marked her producing debut. Stone looked terrific in Western duds playing something of a distaff version of a Clint Eastwood-like gunfighter. Her
directorial choice, Sam Raimi, helmed the smartly derivative tale with style to
spare but the critical reception was uneven and the public stayed away. She
rebounded with her widely acclaimed performance as Ginger, the Vegas hustler who wins the heart of Robert De Niro, in Casino (also 1995).
The highly-paid, much-in-demand star (she has her own production company, Chaos, and has signed a first-look deal with Miramax) next filmed a remake of the noir classic Diabolique with Isabelle Adjani and Chazz Palmentieri. She played a death-row inmate whose lawyer (Rob Morrow) works to save her from execution in Last Dance (both 1996). Stone, a diva who thoroughly enjoys her hard-won stardom, is a clever manipulator of her public image and on heavy press days, she reportedly changes outfits between each interview and photo session, a practice unheard of since the days of Joan Crawford and Norma Shearer. She lives, fittingly enough, in a gated French chateau in Beverly Hills.
Off-camera, Stone uses her intelligence for social good, chairing the American Foundation for AIDS research and supporting numerous other charities.
Movies:
2000 Beautiful Joe
1999 The Muse
1999 Gloria
1999 If These Walls Could Talk 2
1999 Picking up the Pieces
1999 Simpatico
1998 Antz
1998 The Mighty
1998 Sphere
1996 Last Dance
1996 Diabolique
1995 The Quick and the Dead
1995 Casino
1994 Intersection
1994 The Specialist
1993 Sliver
1993 Last Action Hero
1992 Basic Instinct
1992 Where Sleeping Dogs Lie
1992 Diary of a Hitman
1991 Year of the Gun
1991 He Said, She Said
1991 Scissors
1990 Total Recall
1989 Beyond the Stars
1988 Above the Law
1988 Action Jackson
1987 Allan Quartermain & the Lost City of Gold
1987 Police Academy: Citizens Arrest
1987 Cold Steel
1985 King Solomon's Mines
1984 Irreconcilable Differences
1981 Deadly Blessing
1980 Stardust Memories
© 2000 Al Bawaba (www.albawaba.com)
