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Lisa Kudrow could not be further from the character
she plays on the hit NBC sitcom Friends, ditzy New Age musician/masseuse/taxi
driver, Phoebe Buffay. For starters, the character she plays is in
her twenties, while Lisa was born July 30th, 1963, in Encino, California.
While Phoebe only discovered her biological parents a couple of years
ago, Lisa comes from a secure household, where she was raised in Tarzana,
California.
Lisa's father Lee Kudrow is a renowned headache specialist, while
her mother Nedra Kudrow is a travel agent. Although Lisa was a hard
worker and studied intensely while in elementary school, she started
to show an interest in acting at an early age. She would lip sync
to the soundtrack form Fiddler on the Roof, pretending to be one of
the musical's characters. Lisa performed her Fiddler routine in several
classes, a teacher caught a glimpse of her act and was fully impressed.
After graduating from William Howard Taft High School in 1981, where
Lisa played tennis on her free time, she attended Vassar College in
New York where she majored in Biology. When she graduated in 1985,
Lisa initially hoped to pursue a career in medical research and returned
to Los Angeles to work with her father.
As luck would have it, comedian Jon Lovitz, a friend of Lisa's brother's,
had just been cast on Saturday Night Live which reawakened the little
girl in her who loved to act. Lovitz encouraged Lisa to audition for
the improvisational-comedy troupe the Groundlings, to follow her real
passion in life: performing. She was referred to a well-known improvisation
teacher after having been rejected for the Groundlings, but in 1989,
she finally became an official member of the Groundlings team.
After gaining experience and recognition as a member of the popular
comedy troupe, Lisa landed a role in a small production called The
Ladies Room. Her next move as a comedienne was on the small screen
with appearances on shows such as Cheers, Coach, Newhart, Life Goes
On, and The Simpsons.
In 1993, Lisa received the role that ultimately led to her Emmy winning
role as Phoebe on Friends. She was cast as Ursula, the ditzy waitress
on the NBC sitcom Mad About You. NBC was so impressed with her performance,
that they encouraged her to audition for a more substantial part on
another NBC show.
She tried out for the part of Roz on Frazier, but was turned down
as the role did not suit Lisa's character. But the role of Phoebe
fits Lisa like a charm, so much so that people probably think that
that's how she is in real life. Phoebe Buffay is actually the twin
sister of Ursula Buffay, Lisa's Mad About You character, which Lisa
continued to play.
Lisa can add roles in the following movies to her resume: Romy and
Michele's High School Reunion, Clockwatchers, The Opposite of Sex,
1999's Analyze This, co-starring Robert De Niro, and Hanging Up, also
starring the beautiful Meg Ryan.
One of People Magazine's Most Beautiful Women in the World in 1997,
Lisa has received a lot of recognition for her acting skills, including
the Screen Actor's Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by a Female
Actor in a Comedy Series for her role on Friends, an Independent Spirit
Award Nomination for her role in The Opposite of Sex and a nomination
for an American Comedy Award for her role in Analyze This. This broad
recognition shows that Lisa is not typecast as the flaky girl she
plays on Friends.
Lisa and her husband Michael Stern have a son Julian Murray. She
can still be seen every Thursday night on Friends with her fellow
beautiful cast mates, Courteney Cox Arquette and Jennifer Aniston.
Lisa Kudrow Personal videos and photos - Click here!
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