Checking in with JENNIFER CONNELLY
Jennifer Connelly dipped into the world of fantasy early in her career, so it’s not entirely surprising to see her return to it now.
The Oscar-winning actress has gone back to stories of the supernatural and science fiction with reasonable regularity, and her latest is “Dark Matter,” an Apple TV+ series that begins streaming with the first two of its eight episodes Wednesday, May 8. In the adaptation of the book by Blake Crouch (“Wayward Pines”), Connelly plays the wife of a physicist (Joel Edgerton, “The Gift,” 2015) who is taken from his real life into an alternate reality, from which he struggles to get back to the world he knows and to save his family. Alice Braga (“I Am Legend,” 2007), Jimmi Simpson (“Pachinko”) and Oakes Fegley (“Pete’s Dragon,” 2016) also are featured in the drama.
The Jim Henson-directed 1986 fantasy film “Labyrinth” gave Connelly one of her first major roles (opposite David Bowie, “The Man Who Fell to Earth,” 1976) and has attained cult status over the years. Whether for that reason or others, she has returned to otherworldly tales in such projects as “The Rocketeer” (1991), “Dark City” (1998), “Hulk” (2003), “Dark Water” (2005), “The Day the Earth Stood Still” (2008), “Inkheart” (2008), “Winter’s Tale” (2014) and “Alita: Battle Angel” (2019).
At the same time, Connelly projects a down-to-earth relatability that has brought her other prime acting opportunities, as with her Academy Award-honored performance as mathematician John Nash’s (Russell Crowe, “Gladiator,” 2000) wife, Alicia, in director Ron Howard’s “A Beautiful Mind” (2001). That picture also brought her a husband, since she married co-star Paul Bettany (“Wandavision”) later. “House of Sand and Fog” (2003), casting Connelly as a woman trying to regain her former residence from its new tenants, is another of her particularly notable credits.
Connelly still can sense a hit coming, as proven amply by her part as Penny, the bar proprietor and ex-flame of Tom Cruise’s title character in the 2022 mega-success “Top Gun: Maverick.” Being involved in such a blockbuster certainly can give an extra charge to an established career, so Connelly is all but certain to have more media matters — “Dark” or not — on her professional menu for years to come.
Birthdate: Dec. 12, 1970
Birthplace: Cairo, N.Y.
Current residence: New York
Marital status: Married to actor Paul Bettany; they have a son and a daughter, and she also has a son from a previous relationship
Movie credits include: “Bad Behaviour,” “Top Gun: Maverick,” “Alita: Battle Angel,” “Only the Brave,” “Spider-man: Homecoming,” “American Pastoral,” “Shelter,” “Noah,” “Aloft,” “Winter’s Tale,” “Stuck in Love,” “Salvation Boulevard,” “Virginia,” “Creation,” “9,” “He’s Just Not That Into You,” “Inkheart,” “The Day the Earth Stood Still,” “Reservation Road,” “Blood Diamond,” “Little Children,” “Dark Water,” “House of Sand and Fog,” “Hulk,” “A Beautiful Mind,” “Pollock,” “Requiem for a Dream,” “Waking the Dead,” “Dark City,” “Inventing the Abbotts,” “Far Harbor,” “Mulholland Falls,” “Higher Learning,” “Of Love and Shadows.”