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 Famke Janssen mini-bio: Famke Janssen is a Dutch actress and former fashion model. She is perhaps best known for her roles in Goldeneye, Nip/Tuck and the X-Men film series. Janssen moved to the United States in 1984 and began her professional career as a fashion model. She was signed with Elite Model Management, and worked for Yves Saint Laurent, Chanel and Victoria's Secret. After studying writing and literature at Columbia University she moved to Los Angeles where she appeared in guest roles on TV series (such as Star Trek: The Next Generation and Melrose Place). Her first film role was with Jeff Goldblum in Fathers & Sons (1992), later she appeared in the first Pierce Brosnan James Bond film, GoldenEye, making an impression on the cinema world as femme fatale Xenia Onatopp. After her well-received performance, she became one of the most sought after actresses by many directors. In 1998 alone, she starred in eight films. She was also cast in Men in Black II as villainess Serleena in 2002, but had to drop out due to a death in the family. She was also offered the role of the T-X in Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines, but turned it down and was replaced by Kristanna Loken. Janssen played superheroine Dr. Jean Grey/Phoenix in X-Men, X2, and X- Men: The Last Stand. Janssen also starred in the movies Lord of Illusions, The Faculty, House on Haunted Hill, I Spy, Rounders, and Deep Rising. Janssen also had a prominent role in the second season of the popular TV show Nip/Tuck, as seductive and manipulative life coach Ava Moore. She speaks Dutch, English, German, and French and is the only brunette in a family of blondes.
| VITAL STATS | Famke Janssen Information:
| | Eye color:Brown | | Height:5'11 | | Nickname(s):Fam-Fam | | Notable feature(s): Beautiful face | | Education: | | Family: | | Resides in: | | Religious affiliations: | | Political affiliation: | | Personal interests/hobbies:being a goodwill, ambassador | | Charities/Causes: | | Other: |  Famke Beumer was born November 5, 1965 in Amstelveen, part of metropolitan Amsterdam in North Holland. Both her sisters – one older, one younger – are blonde haired and blue eyed, and as a hazel eyed brunette who would grow to 5’11” in height, Beumer had little aspiration to enter the performing arts. As a teenager, she was enrolled in the University of Amsterdam majoring in economics, an experience she later referred to as “the stupidest idea I ever had.” Beumer was approached on the street by a man who introduced himself as a talent scout for a modeling agency. Realizing economics was not her passion and that the modeling agency was actually legit, Beumer dropped out of school and spent the next year traveling Europe on photo shoots.Settling in New York at age 19 – and changing her name toFamke Janssen– she began thinking about a career in acting. “I don’t remember exactly when it happened, but I was a model before, and I knew a lot of models had tried it and they all had this big stigma, like oh, the model turned actress, and they can’t do it … And I thought I’ll go about it a little bit differently than most of them.” Janssen quit modeling in 1988 and spent four years at Columbia University, completing a fine arts degree in creative writing and literature, and studying acting in a workshop instructed by Harold Guskin. Janssen recalls, “I think in the beginning I had to prove that I could act. I think everybody just automatically assumed I couldn’t. And I thought that I would at least have a better chance by having taken a distance from, you know, my modeling career, so that I didn’t have to deal with that stigma so much.” Moving to Los Angeles, Janssen’s screen debut came in 1992 with a part in the virtually unseen thrillerFathers & Sonsstarring Jeff Goldblum. She made a memorable appearance that year onStar Trek: The Next Generationplaying an otherworldly “metamorph” encouraged to choose between servitude and her own free will. Guest spots onThe UntouchablesandMelrose Placefollowed, as did a starring role in the Fox TV movieModel By Day, in which Janssen played a super acrobatic vigilante named Lady X by night … and a model by day. Winning the female lead in a feature film – Clive Barker’sLord of Illusions– positioned Janssen for the break of her career: the role of Russian assassin Xenia Onatopp in the 1995 relaunch of the James Bond franchise,Goldeneye. Onatopp’s villainous feature was crushing men between her thighs.Janssen recalls, “I had no idea if that was going to be the last thing I ever did, and I would have gone down in history as the Bond girl that never went anywhere, like everyone else. I was very much reminded by every single press person that that was going to happen to me. But I went with it, I went with it all the way. And it actually made everything possible for me. All these doors opened that would never have been opened.” Resisting job offers that catered to her physical skills, Janssen took a year off and appeared opposite Harvey Keitel in the gritty crime thrillerCity of Industry. 1998 then saw eight films featuring Janssen hit screens. She played an alcoholic Southern wife for director Robert Altman inThe Gingerbread Man, a Gotham poker ace inRounders, a blue collared Bostonian inMonument Avenueand a Manhattan publicist in Woody Allen’sCelebrity. Janssen spent 21 days starring with Jon Favreau in the indie romantic comedyLove & Sexbefore transitioning into six months of work as telepathic mutant Jean Grey inX-Men, both of which opened in 2000.Love & Sexremains a favorite of Janssen’s. “I loved how unapologetic this woman was about her sex life, love life, messy life in general. It was very refreshing. She had a great sense of humor. She’s a goofball. She’s a lot of things that I really am in life. But it’s not the way people have seen me before.” Returning as Jean Grey forX2(2003) andX3(2006), Janssen also joined the cast ofNip/Tuckfor nine episodes in 2004, playing a life coach who seduces Julian McMahon’s teenaged son, and is later revealed to be a transsexual. She’s starred in thrillers opposite Michael Douglas (Don’t Say A Word) and Robert DeNiro (Hide and Seek) and was part of the comic ensemble for director David Wain inThe Ten.In 2007, Janssen received the best critical notices of her career, playing a pool hustler who reconciles with her with adolescent son inTurn the River, the directorial debut of actor Chris Eigeman. Research into prostitution and corruption she conducted following her work inTaken– one of three films featuring Janssen set for release in 2008 – led to the United Nations naming her a Goodwill Ambassador for Integrity. Interviewed in 2006 about her tendency to be cast as super women, the actress commented, “I’m in a business where 99 percent of casting is typecasting and people compartmentalize me into a specific area – maybe as a powerful alien, because they don’t know where to put me – but it’s up to me to fight against it. I don’t want to be typecast, that’s my big mission in life and it makes it a harder path in this business for me.” | |
