Patricia Arquette Biography:

The youngest daughter of a performing arts family, bubbly and beautiful Patricia Arquette rose through the 1990's independent film world to become a leading performer for directors like Tim Burton, David Lynch and Sean Penn. Her breakthrough in Tony Scott’s crime spree “True Romance” (1993) starring Christian Slater, Val Kilmer, Brad Pitt and Samuel L. Jackson  led to more chancy but trendy films, including “Lost Highway” (1997) and “Stigmata” (1999), but the actress also showed her extensive allure with conventional dramas like Martin Scorsese’s “Bringing Out the Dead” (1999) with Nicolas Cage, and comedies like Adam Sandler's “Little Nicky” (2000) with Reese Witherspoon. 

In 2004, Arquette made an dubious jump to series television with booming success, with her portrayal of a frenzied working mom and gifted psychic in NBC’s “Medium”, about suburban mom Alison Dubois (Arquette) who attempts to balance family life with solving mysteries using her special gift. She can see dead people and can often hear the thoughts of those around her. The series has earned the actress multiple Emmy and Golden Globe nominations.

Patricia Arquette was born on April 8, 1968, though she first received awareness while she was still in the womb. Family tradition stated that while participating in a Civil Rights march that spring, Martin Luther King Jr. spotted weighty mom-to-be Mardi Arquette and insisted she ride on the bus with him. Mardi made it back home to Chicago in time for Arquette’s birth, and there she joined siblings Rosanna, Richmond, and Robert (future transgender performer Alexis). Her father Lewis was a player with the Second City improv group and had earlier been a member of the prominent San Francisco comedy group The Committee. 

Arquette attended arts oriented magnet schools in Los Angeles, staying away from home at age fourteen to live with older sister Rosanna, but focusing in on acting and education with well-known drama coach Milton Katselas. At 18, she landed her first role in the young teen genre picture, “Pretty Smart” (1986), and by the following year, she was pregnant with her first son.

Arquette definitely had a lot of perspective to bring to the role of a young teenage mother in the television movie "Daddy" (ABC, 1987), following that with a genuine run of appearances that tested her hectic schedule as a single mom. She was cast in a starring role in “A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors” (1987) and added a series of credits as wacky young teen girls in “Time Out” (1988) and Sam Shepard's “Far North” (1988), as well as a range of television appearances. Arquette had the honor of starring in two small screen productions directed by Diane Keaton: a CBS Schoolbreak Special entitled "The Boy With the Crazy Brother" (1990) and the show, "Wildflower" (Lifetime, 1991). In the later, the actress played the challenging role of a young teen girl with epilepsy, whose stepfather keeps her locked up, and believing she is possessed by demons. The actress earned a CableACE award for the performance, which showed the actress’ elegance for delicate helplessness, and the sincere quality that was soon in demand by famous film directors.

It was just these traits that stirred first time director Sean Penn to cast Arquette as the affectionate young girlfriend of Viggo Mortensen in "The Indian Runner" (1991). She also portrayed a tear-jerking Mattie Silver, the life energy in the otherwise boring, wintry Wharton adaptation "Ethan Frome" (1993). Arquette’s breakout performance came later that year when she  held her own working with heavy hitters Gary Oldman, Val Kilmer, Christian Slater, Brad Pitt, Samuel L. Jackson, Christopher Walken and Dennis Hopper in the Quentin Tarantino scripted "True Romance.” The much anticipated film also shed light on another side of the actress, that she could credibly beat a man to death in her underwear. 

Tim Burton hired Arquette for  "Ed Wood" (1994) in his black & white biopic on the flawed film director, starring Johnny Depp and Sarah Jessica Parker. The following year Arquette was an astounding but helpful choice to play the lead of an American doctor caught up in the political disorder of Burma in John Boorman’s "Beyond Rangoon" (1995).

Arquette’s mounting prominence in the independent film world seemed complete with her marriage that year to actor Nicholas Cage, who himself had traveled art house terrain on his way to becoming a box office star and sexy celebrity. The couple had first met in 1989, with Cage reportedly proposing to Arquette the first time they met at a Los Angeles deli. The bashful actress sent him away with a treasure hunt of items she would require in order to consider his proposal, including a black orchid, J.D. Salinger’s autograph, and a statue from a Big Boy restaurant. Cage satisfied the conditions, but the couple barely lasted a few dates before going their own ways. Ten years later, they met again by accident, purportedly at the same deli, and decided it had to be fate, tying the knot soon after.

The remarkable actress leaped at the chance to do her first straight-up comedy, starring with Ben Stiller and Tea Leoni as the grumpy spouse of an adopted man seeking his birth parents in "Flirting With Disaster" (1996). Arquette gave a much softer dramatic performance opposite Matthew Broderick in “Infinity” (1996), a drama about Nobel Prize winning physicist Richard Feynman. 

While Arquette received some commendation from reviewers for her role as the murdered wife of a jazz musician and a blonde killer in David Lynch's "Lost Highway" (1997), the film was commonly critiqued for being too perplexing and exaggerated. Arquette played a similar femme fatale type in Stephen Frears’ "The Hi-Lo Country" (1998) with Penelope Cruz, playing the gloomily married ranch wife who starts an affair with a contending cattleman. 

Taking a darker role, she starred in the supernatural thriller "Stigmata" (1999), which opened at number one at the box office but started controversy for its portrayal of the Catholic Church.

Arquette had undoubtedly made a successful changeover from independent film to box office super-star, next appearing in Martin Scorsese’s well-received New York City ambulance drama "Bringing Out the Dead" (1999) with Nicolas Cage. The working relationship may have put the finishing wrench on the pair’s on–again/off-again relationship. They officially divorced a year later. 

Arquette let loose in another large comedy and box office hit, Adam Sandler’s son-of-Satan-send-up, "Little Nicky" (2000). She the appeared in Michel Gondry’s "Human Nature" (2001), taking a difficult role that required her to appear completely nude but covered with piles of fake hair - Arquette had stated early in her career she would never do a nude scene. After appearing as school teacher Kissin’ Kate Barlow in the wacky Disney drama, “Holes” (2003) starring Shia Labeouf and Sigourney Weaver, Arquette gave birth to daughter Harlow and settled into family life with fiancé, actor Thomas Jane, who had romantically proposed at the Silent Movie Theater in Los Angeles.

In 2004, Arquette made a amazing and highly successful move to series television when she was hired on to star as real life psychic and criminal profiler Allison DuBois in “Medium” (NBC, 2004- ). 

The series was admired right from the start, with Arquette bringing an likable earthiness to her role as a wife and mother struggling to balance family and crime-solving psychic visions. After less than a dozen episodes of the mid-season replacement had aired, Arquette found herself nominated for Golden Globe and Emmy Awards, later winning the Emmy for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama Series. In 2006, she received a second Golden Globe nomination and the following year Arquette was again honored with both Golden Globe and Emmy wins for her role on the supernatural hit.

Arquette's next film is not due to be released until 2012, the drama "Boyhood" is about the actual "growing up" of a child and watching the changes in both him and his parents as it is literally filmed each year - in sequence.. 

• Born:
  on 04/08/1968 in Chicago, Illinois
• Job Titles:
  Actor

Family

• Brother: Alexis Arquette. born in 1969. transgender 
• Brother: David Arquette. born on September 8, 1971; married to actress Courteney Cox
• Brother: Richmond Arquette. born 1963
• Daughter: Harlow Olivia Calliope. born Feb. 20, 2003; father is Thomas Jane
• Father: Lewis Arquette. original member of improvisational group The Committee; also member of Paul Sills' Story Theater; divorced from Arquette's mother 1990; died on February 10, 2001 at age 65
• Grandfather: Cliff Arquette.
• Mother: Mardi Arquette. born in August 1939; divorced from Arquette's father 1990; died of breast cancer in August 1997
• Sister: Rosanna Arquette. born on August 10, 1959
• Son: Enzo Luciano Rossi. born on January 3, 1989; father, Paul Rossi

Significant Others

• Companion: Christian Slater. no longer together
• Companion: Matthew McConaughey. dated briefly c. 1994
• Companion: Paul Rossi. father of Enzo
• Companion: Thomas Jane. engaged August 2002

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