(born 1985) is an American actress. Her films in 2009 include Dare, and the upcoming The Winning Season and Tanner Hall. In 2010, she appeared in Youth in Revolt and starred in A Nightmare on Elm Street, a remake of the 1984 horror film.
Mara will next be seen in The Social Network, a film by David Fincher about the founding of Facebook. She has also been cast as Lisbeth Salander, the lead in Fincher's The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, an English-language remake of the Swedish smash hit film of the same name.
Mara oversees the charity Faces of Kibera, which benefits orphans from the Kibera slum in Nairobi, Kenya, one of the largest slums in Africa. She is the younger sister of actress Kate Mara.
Early life
Mara was born and raised in Bedford, New York, a town in Westchester County, a suburb of New York City. She is the daughter of Timothy Christopher Mara, the vice president of player evaluation for the New York Giants, and Kathleen McNulty (née Rooney). She has three siblings: Daniel, Conor and Kate. Mara is the great-granddaughter of Pittsburgh Steelers founder Art Rooney, Sr. and Giants founder Tim Mara.Her grandfather, Tim Rooney, has run Yonkers Raceway in Yonkers, New York since 1972, and her uncle, John Mara, is the co-owner of the New York Giants.
Mara graduated from Fox Lane High School and then travelled to Ecuador, Peru, and Bolivia in South America for four months as part of the Traveling School, an open learning environment. She attended the Gallatin School of Individualized Study at New York University, where she studied psychology, international social policy, and nonprofits.
Mara was inspired to act by going to see musical theatre and by watching old movies, like Gone with the Wind (1939), Rebecca (1940), and Bringing Up Baby (1938), with her mother. She also wanted to be like her older sister, Kate Mara, a professional actress. Mara resisted pursuing acting as a child, stating to The Journal News that "it never seemed that honorable to me, and I guess I was always afraid that I might fail." While at NYU, she acted in a few student films and won the role of Juliet in Romeo and Juliet, after being signed up to audition by a friend. Mara then began pursuing a career in acting.
Acting
Mara made her professional acting debut in a bit-part in the 2005 direct-to-video horror film Urban Legends: Bloody Mary, which starred her sister. She found work in television, appearing on the New York City-based drama Law & Order: Special Victims Unit in 2006, as a girl who dislikes fat people. She guest-starred on the legal drama Women's Murder Club in 2007, and played a drug addict in an episode of The Cleaner in 2008.[8] Mara appeared in the feature films Dream Boy and Friends (With Benefits) that year, and guest-starred as Megan for two episodes of NBC's ER in 2009.
Mara landed her first lead role in the film Tanner Hall, starring Amy Sedaris and Tom Everett Scott, a story of four girls set in a boarding school. Mara played Fernanda, who has an affair with a married family friend (Tom Everett Scott).[9] Mara dropped her first name, Patricia, to be known professionally by her middle name after working on the film. "I never really liked my first name," Mara stated to Paper magazine. "I never felt like a Tricia. And Rooney is more memorable".
Mara's experience lead to other film work, she appeared in the comedy Youth in Revolt, starring Michael Cera and directed by Miguel Arteta. The film is based on the 1993 cult novel of the same name by C.D. Payne.Mara played Taggarty, the love interest of Cera’s best friend. Her character tries to sleep with 50 guys before she goes to college.
Mara appeared in the 2009 independent film Dare as Courtney, the best friend of Alexa (Emmy Rossum), a high school student set on expanding her life experience. She also filmed The Winning Season that year, starring Emma Roberts and Sam Rockwell, playing a high school basketball player in a story similar to The Bad News Bears. Dare and The Winning Season premiered at the 2009 Sundance Film Festival. Mara was included on Filmmaker magazine's list of "25 New Faces of Independent Film" that year.
Mara starred in A Nightmare on Elm Street, a 2010 remake of the 1984 horror film of the same name. She played the protagonist Nancy Holbrook, based on the original film's Nancy Thompson, a teenage girl who is eager to leave town after graduating from high school. Mara began shooting the film in Chicago on May 5, 2009, directed by Samuel Bayer. Mara told Filmmaker that she felt that the remake's Nancy was "completely different from the original" and could be described as "the loneliest girl in the world". The film was released on April 30, 2010. Depending on its box office performance, Mara will appear in a sequel to the remake, continuing her role as Nancy.
Mara appeared at the Hamptons International Film Festival in October 2009 as part of its Breakthrough Performers Program, where she was tutored alongside Zach Gilford, Emmy Rossum and Emma Stone by Sharon Stone.[20] In October 2009, Mara shot the independent feature Kaboom, written and directed by Gregg Araki, about the sexual awakening of a group of college students. She joined Roxane Mesquida, Thomas Dekker, and Kelly Lynch in the cast of the film.
Mara will appear in the 2010 film The Social Network by David Fincher, starring Jesse Eisenberg, Andrew Garfield and Justin Timberlake. Her character breaks up with Mark Zuckerberg, the founder of Facebook, which inspires him to start the social networking website. In August 2010, Mara won the role of Lisbeth Salander over several other actresses in the upcoming Sony Pictures film adaptation of Stieg Larsson’s The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. David Fincher will direct the film, based on the novel The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. The film will begin shooting in Sweden in September 2010; a release date of December 21, 2011 has been set.
Faces of Kibera
Mara oversees the charity Faces of Kibera, which provides housing, food, and medical care for orphans in Kibera, a slum in Nairobi, Kenya where approximately 1 million people live in a single square mile. The charity's goal is to build an orphanage in the region, for which 6 acres of land have been purchased. The charity auctions memorabilia from the Steelers and Giants, as well as training camp events on eBay to raise money.
Mara visited the area as a volunteer, at age 21, and was moved to help the orphans, many whose parents have died from AIDS and HIV-related illnesses. She began the charity due to her frustration with, according to Mara, the growing number of nonprofits that are just business opportunities. "The people who need help aren’t really getting it. So I started my own", she told Interview magazine in 2009. Mara was not really working yet when she started the charity, so now finds it challenging to balance her charity work with her acting career. "I need to do both; I can't just do acting,“ she stated to The Journal News.
Personal life
Mara moved to Los Angeles in early 2007, and lived with her sister temporarily. Although they do not live together anymore, Mara felt that the experience brought them closer together, and they still regularly discuss the film business and movie scripts. Mara described football as "....the glue that holds our family together," to the New York Post. She includes Gena Rowlands among the actors that inspire her, especially her performances in A Woman Under the Influence (1974) and Opening Night (1977).
Filmography
Year Title Role Notes
2005 Urban Legends: Bloody Mary Classroom Girl #1
2006 Law & Order: Special Victims Unit Jessica DeLay TV series - in the episode "Fat"
2007 Women's Murder Club Alexis Sherman TV series - in the episode "Blind Dates and Bleeding Hearts"
2008 Dream Boy Evelyn
The Cleaner Rebecca Smith TV series - in the episode "Rebecca"
2009 Dare Courtney
The Winning Season Wendy
ER Megan TV series - in the episodes "Old Times" and "I Feel Good"
Tanner Hall Fernanda
Friends (With Benefits) Tara
2010 Youth in Revolt Taggarty
A Nightmare on Elm Street Nancy Holbrook
Kaboom
The Social Network
(source:wikipedia)
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