Mary McDonnell

Mary McDonnell, a two-time Oscar(r),-nominated actress, is well famous for her performance on screen in historical and modern roles. She also has a long list of roles on stage as well as screen. Mary Eileen McDonnell was the daughter of John McDonnell (a computer consultant) and Eileen (Mundy), an Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania native. She was raised in Ithaca and attended Fredonia State University of New York. She then attended theatre school, after which she was accepted into the Long Wharf Theatre Company (East Coast). A decade later, she landed her breakthrough film role in Kevin Costner's Dances with Wolves (1990) in which she played "Stands with a Fist" who is a white woman born to the Sioux Indians. The role was so well-loved that she received her first Academy Award nomination. McDonnell has starred in the Lawrence Kasdan films Grand Canyon (1991), and Mumford (1999) in the role of veteran performers as Robert Redford as well as Sidney Poitier. She also was a part of Roland Emmerich's Independence Day (1996), with Will Smith. Margin Call (2011), which was a battle with Kevin Spacey, earned McDonnell the Robert Altman award at the 2012 Independent Spirit Awards. McDonnell was the President Laura Roslin in the critically popular show Battlestar Galactica (2004) on Syfy. McDonnell was a star in four seasons. She garnered an Emmy nomination for her regular guest spot on the popular television series ER (1994). She is the Captain Sharon Raydor on the TNT's successful drama series Major Crimes (2012), the follow-up to The Closer (2005), in which McDonnell was the sole actor and for which she earned an primetime Emmy(r) nomination. For her role as an actress with paraplegia in John Sayles' critically acclaimed film Passion Fish (1992), she was awarded the Best Actress Academy Award(r) nomination and a Golden Globe nomination.