Biography
Even those who fail to recognize her name would instantly know the lithe, slightly diminutive, and ethereally beautiful Ukranian-American actress Vera Farmiga by her distinctive look.
Born August 6, 1973, in Passaic County, NJ, to Ukranian immigrant parents Michael and Luba Farmiga, Vera grew up with six brothers and sisters, in an isolated Ukranian enclave -- so isolated that the young girl purportedly did not learn spoken English until the age of six. As a teenager, she attended a Ukranian Catholic secondary school, and spent much of her free time touring with a Ukranian folk dancing troupe. Though she originally planned to build a career as an optometrist, Farmiga instead ventured off in the opposite direction by enrolling as an undergraduate at Syracuse University's School of Visual and Performing Arts. She began to tour as a theatrical performer shortly after graduation, in the American Conservatory Theater's 1996 production of Shakespeare's Tempest, then took her Broadway bow later that same year, as an understudy in David Jones' mounting of
Ronald Harwood's Taking Sides.
Television work ensued, with spots in such series as Law & Order,
Trinity, UC: Undercover, and
Touching Evil. At about the same time (around 1998), Farmiga made her rather modest cinematic debut in
Sleeping With the Enemy director
Joseph Ruben's little-seen
Return to Paradise, starring
Vince Vaughn and
Anne Heche. Many additional roles followed throughout the first years of the new millennium, including that of Lisa,
Richard Gere's estranged daughter, in the soapy melodrama
Autumn in New York; Lorena,
Adrien Brody's unemployment counselor in the Greg Pritikin-helmed 2002 comedy
Dummy; and Allison in
Eric Schaeffer's fine (albeit overlooked) ensemble film
Mind the Gap (2004), where she appears alongside such notables as
John Heard and the late
Alan King. Farmiga joined the cast of
Jonathan Demme's 2004
Manchurian Candidate remake, alongside
Denzel Washington,
Meryl Streep, and
Liev Schreiber; though not among the top-billed performers, the appearance served her career favorably.
She fared much better (on all fronts) with a starring role in that same year's visceral indie addiction drama
Down to the Bone, winner of the Special Jury Prize at Sundance and a critical darling. As Irene, a coke-addled supermarket checker and mother of two, Farmiga drew raves from such sources as The New York Times and The Village Voice for, in one reviewer's words, "a pitch-perfect performance." (She also reeled in a Los Angeles Film Critics' Association award for that role -- no small accomplishment, indeed.) 2006 brought with it a role as Teresa in Wayne Kramer's thriller
Running Scared, and appearances in such features as
Anthony Minghella's Breaking & Entering and
Martin Scorsese's
The Departed (both 2006). The Minghella drama concerns a group of ethnic locals whose lives intersect -- and catalyze violent hostilities -- in the scuzzy King's Cross section of London; as Oana, Farmiga draws heavily on her Eastern European background. In the Scorsese picture, a Beantown cops-and-mobsters crime drama, Farmiga plays Madeleine, the female lead opposite heavyweights
Matt Damon,
Leonardo DiCaprio, and
Jack Nicholson. Meanwhile, Farmiga signed for the role of Fiona, a woman who enters an affair with paraplegic radio personality Isaac (portrayed by
In the Bedroom's
Nick Stahl) in Carlos Brooks'
Quid Pro Quo (2007).
Farmiga is married to the actor Sebastian Roche, whom she met on the set of the television series
Roar. ~ Nathan Southern, All Movie Guide