Certainly, a lot of the films I've worked on have ended up good movies, but they haven't always been the best experiences.
I am an ordinary person.
I don't think of myself as a movie star and I can pretty easily convince other people that I'm not a movie star.
I don't think you can ever completely transform yourself on film, but if you do your job well, you can make people believe that you're the character you're trying to be.
I haven't wanted to play a mother for a long time because I am one.
I like hard rock, and classic rock, and even metal.
I never trusted good-looking boys.
I'm a character actress, plain and simple.
I'm a character actress, plain and simple... Who can worry about a career? Have a life. Movie stars have careers - actors work, and then they don't work, and then they work again.
It's a scary thing going into the workforce with a $50,000 debt and you've been trained as a classical theatre actor. There's always a depression in the theatre.
It's much easier to play supporting roles because that's what I do in my life: I support my son.
Most women's pictures are as boring and as formulaic as men's pictures. In place of a car chase or a battle scene, what you get is an extreme closeup of a woman breaking down.
Movie stars have careers - actors work, and then they don't work, and then they work again.
The fact that I'm sleeping with the director may have something to do with it.
The only power you have is the word no.
There's only two givens with choosing acting as a profession: one is you will always be unemployed, always, and it doesn't matter how much money you make, you're still always going to be unemployed; and that you have no power.
Who can worry about a career? Have a life.
[On how she got the part in Fargo (1996)] "The fact that I'm sleeping with the director may have something to do with it."
On playing 'mothers': "Those roles weren't just mothers in a story about a male protagonist. First they were specific, three-dimensional people."
On "women's pictures": "Most women's pictures are as boring and as formulaic as men's pictures. In place of a car chase or a battle scene, what you get is an extreme closeup of a woman breaking down. I cry too, maybe three times a week, but it's not in closeup. It's a wide shot. It's in the context of a very large and very mean world."
I'm a character actress, plain and simple...Who can worry about a career? Have a life. Movie stars have careers - actors work, and then they don't work, and then they work again.
Has one son, Pedro McDormand Coen, adopted from Paraguay in 1994
Once lived in an apartment with Joel Coen, Ethan Coen, Sam Raimi, Scott Spiegel and Holly Hunter
Was the third and youngest child adopted by her minister father Vernon and his wife, Noreen.
Raised in Monessen, Pennsylvania.
Sister-in-law of Ethan Coen and Tricia Cooke.
Both of her parents were born in Canada. Her father, Vernon McDormand, was a Disciples of Christ minister and her mother, Noreen McDormand, a housewife.
She attended Bethany College, Bethany, West Virginia and received her B.A. in Theater, 1979. Then she attended Yale University School of Drama, New Haven, Connecticut and received her M.F.A., 1982.
Was jury president of Berlin film festival 2004.
Her Oscar-winning role, as Marge Gunderson from her 1996 film Fargo (1996), was ranked #33 in the American Film Institute's Heroes list in their 100 years of The Greatest Screen Heroes and Villains.
Was nominated for Broadway's 1988 Tony Award as Best Actress (Play) for a revival of Tennessee Williams' "A Streetcar Named Desire."
Was listed as a potential nominee on the 2006 Razzie Award nominating ballot. She was listed as a suggestion in the Worst Supporting Actress category for her performance in the film Æon Flux (2005). However, she failed to receive a nomination. (Had she gotten the nomination, she would have been one of the few to be nominated for both Best Supporting Actress at the Oscars, for North Country (2005), and Worst Supporting Actress at the Razzies in the same year.)
With the exception of Almost Famous (2000) and Mississippi Burning (1988), two of her four Oscar-nominated roles were in films that took place in Minnesota: Fargo (1996) and North Country (2005).
Her performance as "Marge Gunderson" in Fargo (1996) is ranked #27 on Premiere Magazine's 100 Greatest Movie Characters of All Time.
As of 2007, six women have received Best Actress nominations for performances directed by their spouse - Frances is the only one to actually win. The other five are Gena Rowlands for A Woman Under the Influence (1974), Joanne Woodward for Rachel, Rachel (1968), Julie Andrews for Victor Victoria (1982), Elisabeth Bergner for Escape Me Never (1935) and Jean Simmons for The Happy Ending (1969). Jules Dassin also directed his future wife Melina Mercouri in an Oscar-nominated performance (Pote tin Kyriaki (1960)), but they weren't married yet at the time of the nomination.
Co-starred with Charlize Theron in two films during the same year (Æon Flux (2005) and North Country (2005)).
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