Rebecca De Mornay

De Mornay was born Rebecca Jane Pearch in Santa Rosa, California, in 1959[2] (although many sources erroneously list 1961 or 1962).[3][4][5][6][7] Her parents were Julie (née Eagar)[8] and Wally George (né George Walter Pearch), a disc jockey and later television host.[9] Her paternal grandmother was vaudeville performer and child film actress Eugenia Clinchard.

Her parents divorced when she was two years old.[10] She took her stepfather's surname, De Mornay, when she was five. She attended the independent Summerhill School in Leiston, Suffolk, England.[11] She later trained as an actress in New York at the Lee Strasberg Institute.[12]

De Mornay's film debut was a small part in Francis Ford Coppola's 1981 film One from the Heart, which starred her real-life partner at the time, Harry Dean Stanton.[13][14] Her star-making role came two years later in Risky Business (1983), as a call girl who seduces a high-school student played by Tom Cruise. In 1985, she played the title role in The Slugger's Wife opposite Michael O'Keefe, and co-starred in The Trip to Bountiful and Runaway Train, both of which were nominated for several Academy Awards. That same year, she appeared with Starship's Mickey Thomas in the music video for the song "Sara". The song reached #1 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart on March 15, 1986.

She also appeared in Roger Vadim's provocative 1988 remake of And God Created Woman, and as the wife of Kurt Russell's character in Ron Howard's Backdraft (1991). One of De Mornay's most commercially successful films was the thriller The Hand That Rocks the Cradle, released in 1992. She starred as a defense lawyer in Sidney Lumet's murder drama Guilty as Sin (1993) with Don Johnson. Then she appeared in the 1995 drama film Never Talk to Strangers opposite Antonio Banderas, for which she was also the executive producer.

In 2003, she guest-starred as primary antagonist in the first two episodes of season 2 of Boomtown. In 2004, she guest-starred as attorney Hannah Rose for the last few episodes of The Practice and the following year, had a brief role alongside Owen Wilson and Vince Vaughn in Wedding Crashers. De Mornay also starred in the 2007 drama American Venus.[1]

In June 2007, she appeared in the HBO series John from Cincinnati with a starring role as matriarch of a troubled Imperial Beach, California surfing family and the grandmother/guardian of a teen surfer on the brink of greatness. She appeared in Darren Lynn Bousman's Mother's Day (2010).

In 2012, De Mornay played the role of Finch's mom in the movie American Reunion where she portrayed an attractive older woman and a love interest of Stifler. From 2015 to 2019, she appeared in Marvel's Jessica Jones as Trish Walker's abusive mother.[15]

De Mornay married writer Bruce Wagner on December 16, 1986; they divorced in 1990.[16]

De Mornay subsequently dated and was briefly engaged to singer Leonard Cohen.[17][18] She co-produced Cohen's 1992 album The Future, which is also dedicated to her with an inscription that quotes Rebecca's coming to the well from the chapter 24 Book of Genesis[19] and giving drink to Eliezer's camels, after he prayed for the help.[20]

De Mornay had a relationship with actor turned sportcaster Patrick O'Neal that produced two daughters: Sophia (born November 16, 1997) and Veronica (born March 31, 2001).[21][22]

• "The Key to Rebecca". Saturday Review. 12 (1): 30–34. January–February 1986.
• Tykus, Michael J. (2000). "Rebecca de Mornay". Contemporary Theatre, Film, and Television. 29. Gale Research Co. p. 135. ISBN 978-0-7876-3188-8.
• Room, Adrian (2010). "Rebecca de Mornay". Dictionary of Pseudonyms: 13,000 Assumed Names and Their Origins (5th ed.). McFarland. p. 141. ISBN 978-0-7864-4373-4.
• Segrave, Kerry; Martin, Linda (1990). "Rebecca de Mornay". The Post-Feminist Hollywood Actress: biographies and filmographies of stars born after 1939. McFarland & Co. pp. 265–269. ISBN 978-0-89950-387-5.
• Aylesworth, Thomas G.; Bowman, John S.; Fairbanks, Douglas (1992). "De Mornay, Rebecca". World Guide to Film Stars. Great Pond. p. 69. ISBN 978-1-56657-007-7.
• Sleeman, Elizabeth (2001). "De Mornay, Rebecca". The International Who's Who of Women 2002 (3rd ed.). Routledge. p. 131. ISBN 978-1-85743-122-3.
• Riggs, Thomas, ed. (2005). "De MORNAY, Rebecca". Contemporary Theatre, Film and Television: A Biographical Guide. 64. Gale / Cengage Learning. ISBN 978-0-7876-9037-3.

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Rebecca De Mornay.

• Rebecca De Mornay at IMDb
• Rebecca De Mornay at the TCM Movie Database
• Rebecca De Mornay at Rotten Tomatoes