American actress, comedian, writer, and producer, best known for her role as the ditzy Phoebe on the hit TV show, Friends (1994-2004). She earned an Emmy nomination for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series during the show’s debut season, 1994-1995, and in 1998, nominated again, she took home the award. She won raves for her 1998 performance in The Opposite of Sex, and subsequently received the New York Film Critics Award.
Raised in Tarzana, California, by her father, Lee, a neurologist and her mother, Nedra, a travel agent, Lisa had three siblings. She was a bookworm, but was asked to perform her lip-synch act of Fiddler on the Roof for her fellow 6th grade students. A varsity-level tennis player, she graduated from William Howard Taft High School in Woodland Hills, California on 18 June 1981, and entered Vassar College in Poughkeepsie, New York, where she earned a Bachelor of Science Degree in Biology. Although she originally planned a career in research, she turned her focus toward acting at the prompting of a family friend.
She joined the Los Angeles improvisational group, “The Groundlings,” and soon won small roles in various films. Her first break came in 1993, with a recurring role in the hit NBC TV comedy, Mad About You, playing Ursula, the waitress from hell. Since the same network produced Friends, the writers threw in a unique twist by making Ursula and Phoebe twin sisters. Lisa has little in common with the nutty, somewhat neurotic, sisters she portrays; she is intelligent and grounded.
Kudrow landed her first leading role in the 1997 comedy, Romy and Michele’s High School Reunion, and in 1999 she starred with Diane Keaton and Meg Ryan in the comedy, Hanging Up. She has received nominations from the Golden Globe, Screen Actors Guild and American Comedy Awards. The 5 ft 9 in (1.75 m) blonde-haired, green-eyed beauty, chosen in 1997 by People magazine as one of the “50 Most Beautiful People in the World,” is an accomplished pool player who has mastered various trick shots.
Kudrow married Michael Stern, an advertising executive, on 27 May 1995, and their son Julian Murray was born on 7 May 1998.
On 23 January 2004 she and the rest of the cast of top-rated series Friends filmed their last episode which aired on 6 May 2004.
In 2007, Kudrow received praise for her starring role in the film Kabluey and appeared in the box office hit film P.S. I Love You. She produced and starred in the Showtime program Web Therapy (2011–2015), which was nominated for a Primetime Emmy Award. She is a producer on the TLC reality program Who Do You Think You Are, which has garnered her five Primetime Emmy Award nominations.
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