Mary McDonnell

Mary McDonnell, a two-time Oscar(r),-nominated actress, is best known for her portrayals on screen in both modern and historical roles. She also has a lengthy history of acting roles on stage and screen. Mary Eileen McDonnell is a Pennsylvania-born actress. She was the child of Eileen (Mundy), an Irish-American computer consultant, as well as John McDonnell. Born in Ithaca, New York, she graduated from the State University of New York (SUNY) at Fredonia. After that, she went to the drama school and was accepted to the Long Wharf Theatre Company in East Coast. In the following two decades she scored her first major film role, in Kevin Costner's Dances with Wolves (1990) where she played "Stands with a Fist" as a white woman raised by the Sioux Indians. The role was so well-loved that she was awarded her first Academy Award nomination. McDonnell's film credits include Lawrence Kasdan's Grand Canyon (1991) & Mumford (1999), opposite veteran actors like Robert Redford, Sidney Poitier and Ben Kingsley; Roland Emmerich’s Independence Day (1996) (starring Will Smith); the popular art house cult hit Donnie Darko (192001); and Margin Call (2011). This earned her the Robert Altman Awards at the 2012 Independent Spirit Awards. On the smaller screen, McDonnell starred in four seasons of the Syfy Network's award-winning series Battlestar Galactica (2004) in her critically acclaimed performance as President Laura Roslin. She earned an Emmy nomination for her regular guest appearance on the tv show ER (1994). TNT's hit drama series Major Crimes (2012) features McDonnell as Captain Sharon Raydor. This is the sequel to The Closer (2005) in which McDonnell developed the role. She was nominated for the Primetime Emmy(r). The character she played as a paraplegic star of soap opera in John Sayles' critically acclaimed film Passion Fish (1992) earned her a Best Actress Academy Award (r) nomination as well as an Academy Award nomination. Golden Globe nod.