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Octavia Spencer

Octavia Spencer

Octavia Spencer was born in Montgomery, AL. The sixth of seven siblings, the future star always knew that she would pursue a career in the film industry, but never thought that it would be as an actress. She attended Auburn University in Auburn, where she graduated with a bachelor's degree in liberal arts. In 1996, Spencer made her film-acting debut in the crime drama "A Time to Kill," based on the best-selling 1989 novel by John Grisham. In the popular film starring Sandra Bullock and Matthew McConaughey, she played a nurse who tended to Ellen Roark (Bullock) after her assault by members of a Ku Klux Klan chapter in a rural town in Mississippi. Adding to her résumé, Spencer appeared on a number of sitcoms such as "Moesha" (UPN, 1996-2001), and guest starred countless times as a nurse on dramas like "Chicago Hope" (CBS, 1994-2000), "Roswell" (The WB, 1999-2001; UPN, 2001-02) and "The X-Files" (Fox, 1993-2002). Spencer also landed small parts in feature comedies such as "Big Momma's House" (2000) starring Martin Lawrence and "Beauty Shop" (2005) as one of the opinionated clients who frequent a new salon run by its equally sassy owner (Queen Latifah). Aside from her film and TV projects, Spencer was also a talented stage actress. She received accolades for her performance in the Los Angeles production of "The Trials and Tribulations of a Trailer Trash Housewife" (2003) opposite veteran stage performers Beth Grant, Dale Dickey and David Steen.In 2007, Spencer became one of the most buzzed about stars of the comedy series "Halfway Home," an improvised show about the daily adventures and mishaps of five ex-cons living together in a rehab facility. Her character, Serenity Johnson, served time for armed robbery and was, ironically, the most aggressive in the group. She had delusions of fame after landing an interview for a reality show about criminals, only to find out later that the show was titled "America's Stupidest Criminals." On a definite career roll, Spencer next had a recurring role on the hit ABC series "Ugly Betty," as an immigration agent who stalked the father of Betty Suarez (America Ferrera). In 2008, Spencer delivered an emotionally charged performance in "Seven Pounds," playing the caretaker of Rosario Dawson's character, a terminally ill patient who receives the heart of a man (Will Smith) who seeks redemption by donating his vital organs to seven people.After appearing in countless films and shows as a memorable supporting player, Spencer scored a major part in the highly anticipated film adaptation of Kathryn Stockett's best-selling novel "The Help," as one of the African-American servants persuaded by an aspiring writer (Emma Stone) to secretly write a book about their lives in service to white families in 1960s Mississippi. Spencer played the feisty and defiant Minny Jackson, a great cook whose sharp tongue always landed her in trouble with her employers. Stockett apparently wrote the character Minny with Spencer with mind. The two women met for the first time while Stockett was in the midst of writing her novel, and incorporated Spencer's physicality and mannerisms as she developed Minny. Prior to the film's release, Spencer spoke out against controversy, mostly from the African-American community, regarding her role as a "maid" in the film. In interviews, she noted that critics should focus on the characters' breadth of emotions rather than just their occupation. Her hard work paid off when she won both a Golden Globe and an Oscar for Best Supporting Actress.Supporting roles in dysfunctional-family comedy "Peep World" (2012) and alcoholism drama "Smashed" (2012) were followed by a key role in Ryan Coogler's indie drama "Fruitvale Station" (2013), a film dramatizing the last day of Oscar Grant, a young black man shot to death by transit cops in a subway station in Oakland, California in 2009. Another acclaimed film, dystopian science fiction thriller "Snowpiercer" (2013), was followed by "Paradise" (2013), a comedy-drama written and directed by Diablo Cody, and the James Brown biopic "Get On Up" (2014). Spencer also landed her first leading role on television in the medical comedy-drama "Red Band Society" (Fox 2014-15), but the series received middling reviews and ratings and was quietly canceled after its initial 13-episode order. A supporting role in "The Great Gilly Hopkins" (2014), based on the children's book, was followed by the child-custody tearjerker "Black or White" (2015), in which she starred opposite Kevin Costner. Spencer next appeared in the young adult action hit "The Divergent Series: Insurgent" (2015) as Johanna Reyes, a role she reprised in the sequel "The Divergent Series: Allegiant" (2016). Her first voice role came in the animated blockbuster "Zootopia" (2016). That same year, Spencer teamed with Taraji P. Henson and Janelle Monaé in Theodore Melfi's "Hidden Figures" (2016), a fact-based drama set at NASA headquarters in Florida in the early '60s, where three brilliant African-American women fought racism and sexism while their engineering and mathematic work helped launch the U.S. ahead of the Soviet Union in the space race. A critical and commercial success, the film gave Spencer her second Academy Award nomination, for Best Supporting Actress. Spencer's next big-screen appearance came as a manifestation of God in "The Shack" (2017), a religious parable based on a best-selling novel that proved to be a critical and commercial disappointment.
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