Meryl Streep on screen and stage

Meryl Streep is an American actress who has had an extensive career in film, television, and stage.[1][2] She made her stage debut in 1975 with The Public Theater production of Trelawny of the 'Wells'.[3] She went on to perform several roles on stage in the 1970s, garnering a Tony Award nomination for her role in 27 Wagons Full of Cotton (1976).[4] In 1977, Streep starred in the television movie The Deadliest Season, and made her film debut with a brief role alongside Jane Fonda in Julia.[5] A supporting role in the war drama The Deer Hunter (1978) proved to be a breakthrough for Streep; she received her first Academy Award nomination for it.[6] She won the award the following year for playing a troubled wife in the top-grossing drama Kramer vs. Kramer (1979).[7] Also in 1978, Streep played a German woman married to a Jewish man in Nazi Germany in the television miniseries Holocaust, which earned her the Emmy Award for Best Actress.[8]

Meryl Streep in the late 1970s

Streep established herself as a leading Hollywood actress in the 1980s.[9][10] She played dual roles in the period drama The French Lieutenant's Woman (1981),[10] and starred as a Polish Holocaust survivor in Sophie's Choice (1982).[11] She was awarded the Best Actress Oscar for the latter.[8] Streep portrayed the real-life character of Karen Silkwood in Mike Nichols' drama Silkwood (1983),[12] before starring in her most financially successful release of the decade, the romantic drama Out of Africa (1985), in which she played the Danish writer Karen Blixen.[13][14] Despite intermittent successes, Streep's career went through a period of decline post-1985, with several commentators criticizing her for her inclination towards melodramatic roles.[15] The criticism continued despite her attempts to actively star in commercial comedies, films that parodied women's beauty and aging, She-Devil (1989) and Death Becomes Her (1992).[16]

In 1995, Streep starred opposite Clint Eastwood as an unhappily married woman in The Bridges of Madison County, her biggest critical and commercial success of the decade.[14][17] Although her dramas of the late 1990s received a mixed reception overall,[18][19] she was praised for her role as a cancer patient in One True Thing (1998).[20] She had acclaimed roles in the 2002 films Adaptation. and The Hours, and won a second Emmy Award for the television miniseries Angels in America a year later, though she failed to replicate her earlier success.[21][22] This changed in 2006, with an Academy Award-nominated role as a ruthless fashion magazine editor in the comedy-drama The Devil Wears Prada.[23] This late-period success led to starring roles in several high-profile films, including the US$609 million-grossing romantic comedy Mamma Mia! (2008), her highest-grossing release, and the comedy-drama Julie & Julia (2009), in which she played Julia Child.[24][25] These roles re-established Streep's stardom in Hollywood.[26] Her portrayal of Margaret Thatcher in the biopic The Iron Lady (2011) earned her another Academy Award for Best Actress.[27] The starring role of Katharine Graham in the 2017 drama The Post garnered Streep her 21st Oscar nomination, more than any actor or actress in history.[28]