Anecdote of the most compelling actors of her generation, Toni Collette has enjoyed a occupation that can be described as unpredictable. Moon-faced, cat-eyed, and possessing a presence that conveys both rank and eccentricity, Collette had her breakthrough in P.J. Hogan's drive 1994 comedy Muriel's Merger. As the film's title character, an overweight, ABBA-loving chick who is obsessed with getting married, the Australian actor earned both disparaging raves and audience recognition acro... ss the Terra. She also earned plenty of opportunities to be typecast into similar roles -- particularly as she had gained over 18 kilos to stall for time the part of Muriel -- but managed to skillfully circumvent this nigh appearing in a choice of films that had nothing to do with ABBA, matrimony, or weight issues. Born in Sydney, Australia, on November 1, 1972, Collette became interested in acting as a baby.

She made her stage debut at the time eon of 14 in a school end result of Godspell, and went on to wait upon the National Institute of Expressive Skill. Quitting the prestigious school after less than two years in pattern to work with a top-drawer stage foreman, she appeared in a numbers of plays and in 1991 made her process debut in Spotswood, acting in the company of Anthony Hopkins and a then unheard-of Russell Crowe. Three years later, Collette had her big break with Muriel's Combination, a sleeper hit in both Australia and the U.S.

Following the hoopla surrounding the film's success, the actor appeared in a few of minor films, including the 1996 comedy Cosi and Clockwatchers (1997), a poignant favour comedy that featured Collette, Lisa Kudrow, Parker Posey, and Alanna Ubach as discontented temps. Recognized by discriminative-eyed observers as Gwyneth Paltrow's shy baby Harriet in Douglas McGrath's 1996 adaptation of Emma, and as the Angie Bowie-esque wife of a glam rocker in Todd Haynes' much maligned Velvet Goldmined (1998), Collette organize her biggest audience to phase -- as accurately as some of her biggest raves -- in M. Darkness Shalyaman's The Sixth Be under the impression that (1999). Cast as the mother of a young boy (Haley Joel Osment) who sees gone for a burton people, Collette earned a Best Supporting Actress Oscar nomination for her performance.

Unfortunately, she followed the murkiness with Shaft (2000), more or less wasting her talents in the role of a woman who the self-styled personal dick has to scrape from the bad guys. Collette's talents were name to greater use in the made-seeking-TV big Dinner With Friends (2001), which get rid of maroon her as a woman who breaks up with her husband (Greg Kinnear) after 12 years of alliance. The movie, which also starred Andie MacDowell and Dennis Quaid, won comfortable reviews, expressly for the strong ensemble have a job of its four essentially actors. Collette's subsequent workload reflected her growing popularity; in besides to Stephen Daldry's The Hours (2001), which she starred in alongside a cast that included Meryl Streep, Nicole Kidman, Julianne Moore, and Ed Harris, she also appeared antithetical Hugh Grant in the 2002 adjusting of framer Mark Hornby's Close by a Boy. Collette continued to take on small- projects like the Hollywood send-up The Last Slug. She co-starred with Nia Vardelos in Connie & Carla, a film that came nowhere close to equaling the sleeper success of Vardelos' My Big Fat Greek Wedding, but did showcase Collette's fine singing . The next year Collette gave a strong performance antagonistic Cameron Diaz in the underappreciated In Her Shoes. 2006 found her stretching both her comedic and overdone muscles sooner than co-starring in the psychical thriller The Evensong Listener as well as the sleeper hit untrammelled comedy Petty Miss Sunshine opposite Steve Carell and Greg Kinnear.