Burstyn debuted on Broadway in 1957 and joined Lee Strasberg’s The Actors Studio in New York City, New York, in 1967. In 1975, she won a Tony Award for Best Performance by a Leading Actress in a Play for her performance in the comedy Same Time, Next Year (a role she would reprise in the film version in 1978). Until 1970, she was credited as Ellen McRae in nearly all her film and television appearances.
Burstyn received Academy Award nominations for Best Supporting Actress in 1971 for her role in the drama film The Last Picture Show and for Best Actress in 1973 for the horror film The Exorcist. She won the Academy Award for Best Actress in 1974 for her performance in the drama Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore, directed by Martin Scorsese. She also received Best Actress nominations in 1978 for Same Time, Next Year, in 1980 for the fantasy-drama Resurrection, and for the drama Requiem for a Dream in 2000.
In the early to mid 1960s, Burstyn played Dr. Kate Bartok on the NBC… read more
Burstyn debuted on Broadway in 1957 and joined Lee Strasberg’s The Actors Studio in New York City, New York, in 1967. In 1975, she won a Tony Award for Best Performance by a Leading Actress in a Play for her performance in the comedy Same Time, Next Year (a role she would reprise in the film version in 1978). Until 1970, she was credited as Ellen McRae in nearly all her film and television appearances.
Burstyn received Academy Award nominations for Best Supporting Actress in 1971 for her role in the drama film The Last Picture Show and for Best Actress in 1973 for the horror film The Exorcist. She won the Academy Award for Best Actress in 1974 for her performance in the drama Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore, directed by Martin Scorsese. She also received Best Actress nominations in 1978 for Same Time, Next Year, in 1980 for the fantasy-drama Resurrection, and for the drama Requiem for a Dream in 2000.
In the early to mid 1960s, Burstyn played Dr. Kate Bartok on the NBC television soap opera The Doctors. She worked on several primetime television shows of the 1960s, including guest appearances on Perry Mason, The Virginian, Maverick, Wagon Train, 77 Sunset Strip, The Big Valley and Gunsmoke. She hosted NBC’s Saturday Night Live, a late-night sketch comedy and variety show, in 1980.
In 1986, she had her own ABC television situation comedy, The Ellen Burstyn Show costarring Megan Mullally as her daughter and Elaine Stritch as her mother; it was canceled after one season. From 2000 to 2002, Burstyn appeared in the CBS television drama That’s Life. In 2006, she starred as a Epicopalian bishop in the controversial NBC comedy-drama series The Book of Daniel; although eight episodes from taped, it was canceled after four episodes.
In 2006, Burstyn appeared in the drama-romance film The Fountain, directed by Darren Aronofsky, with whom she worked in Requiem for a Dream. Since 2007, she has had an occasional recurring role on the HBO television drama series Big Love, playing the mother of polygamist wife Barbara Henrickson.
She provided a supporting role as the mother of two sons in the drama-romance film The Elephant King . The film originally premièred at the 2006 Tribeca Film Festival but did not open in U.S. theaters until October 2008. At the time, it was credited as receiving the highest per-screen opening gross as any film in the country.
Burstyn returned to the stage from March 18–May 4, 2008, in an Off-Broadway production of Stephen Adly Guirgis’s The Little Flower of East Orange, directed by Philip Seymour Hoffman in a co-production by LAByrinth Theater Company and The Public Theater; Burstyn played the title role of Marie Therese.
In addition to her stage work, Burstyn portrayed former First Lady Barbara Bush in director Oliver Stone’s biographical film W in 2008.
In 2009, she won a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Guest Actress in a Drama Series for her portrayal of the bipolar estranged mother of Detective Elliot Stabler on NBC’s police procedural Law & Order: Special Victims Unit. With this win, Burstyn became the eighteenth actor to win the “triple crown of acting” —an Academy, Emmy and Tony Award.
