Laura Dern

Laura Dern was married to musician Ben Harper from 2005 until their divorce was finalized in 2013. They have two children together, son Ellery Walker and daughter Jaya, and Dern became stepmother to Harper's children from his first marriage.

Dern is the daughter of actors Bruce Dern and Diane Ladd. Her parents divorced when she was two, and she was largely raised by her mother and maternal grandmother, Mary, who had Norwegian ancestry.

Dern began appearing in films featuring her mother, with an uncredited appearance in White Lightning in 1973 and a small role in Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore in 1974. Her first credited film role was opposite Jodie Foster in Foxes in 1980. She later appeared in Ladies and Gentlemen, The Fabulous Stains, Teachers, Mask, and Smooth Talk.

At 16, Dern sought emancipation so she could work the same number of hours as an adult on film productions. She enrolled at the Lee Strasberg Theatre and Film Institute and briefly attended UCLA before leaving to make Blue Velvet.

Dern's performances in Mask and Smooth Talk drew critical attention, while her role as Sandy Williams in David Lynch's Blue Velvet became her breakthrough performance. She continued her collaboration with Lynch in Wild at Heart and Inland Empire, and also starred with Nicolas Cage in Wild at Heart.

Her international recognition came with Steven Spielberg's Jurassic Park in 1993, in which she played courageous paleobotanist Ellie Sattler opposite Sam Neill and Jeff Goldblum. She reprised the role in Jurassic Park III and Jurassic World Dominion. Dern also appeared in the landmark 1997 episode of Ellen, playing Susan Richmond, a lesbian whose interaction with Ellen Morgan prompts the character's coming-out declaration. The episode generated a public backlash, and Dern later said she needed a security detail and did not work for a year afterward.

In Rambling Rose (1991), Dern played the title character, an orphaned and sexually precocious young woman. Her performance earned her an Academy Award nomination for Best Actress, while Diane Ladd received a nomination for Best Supporting Actress. Their nominations made them the first mother and daughter nominated for acting awards for the same film.

Dern continued to choose varied roles, including the teacher Miss Riley in October Sky, the foster mother Randy Carpenter in I Am Sam, and the troubled title character in Alexander Payne's Citizen Ruth. She also appeared in A Perfect World, The Master, Certain Women, The Tale, and Wild, for which she received another Academy Award nomination.

Dern co-created and starred in the HBO series Enlightened from 2011 to 2013, playing Amy Jellicoe, a self-destructive woman trying to rebuild her life after a breakdown. She also served as an executive producer on the series and won a Golden Globe for the role.

She played Renata Klein in HBO's Big Little Lies, winning a Primetime Emmy Award and a Golden Globe. In 2019, she portrayed divorce lawyer Nora Fanshaw in Noah Baumbach's Marriage Story, a performance that earned her the Academy Award, BAFTA Award, Golden Globe, and Screen Actors Guild Award for Best Supporting Actress. That year she also played Marmee March in Greta Gerwig's Little Women.

Dern joined the Star Wars franchise as Vice Admiral Amilyn Holdo in The Last Jedi and appeared in David Lynch's Twin Peaks: The Return. She later starred in The Son, Lonely Planet, and the Apple TV+ series Palm Royale, in which she also served as an executive producer.

Her honors include an Academy Award, a BAFTA Award, a Primetime Emmy Award, and five Golden Globe Awards. In 2010, Dern and her parents, Diane Ladd and Bruce Dern, received stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, becoming the first family to receive stars together.