Mercedes Ruehl

Mercedes Ruehl is an American actress born on February 28, 1948, in Jackson Heights, Queens, New York City. Her father, Vincent Ruehl, was an FBI agent of German and Irish descent, and her mother, Mercedes J. Ruehl, was a schoolteacher of Cuban and Irish descent. The family relocated frequently during her childhood due to her father's FBI assignments, living at various points in states including Maryland. She and her brother Peter were raised Catholic. Ruehl earned a Bachelor of Arts in English from the College of New Rochelle in 1969.

She began her acting career in New York City through off-off-Broadway productions while supporting herself with temporary and waitressing work. She built a regional theater foundation with the Denver Center Theatre Company before establishing herself on Broadway. In 1980, she came close to joining the cast of Saturday Night Live for its sixth season but lost the slot to Denny Dillon. Her Broadway debut came in 1985 in Herb Gardner's I'm Not Rappaport. During this period she also earned an Obie Award for her performance in The Marriage of Bette and Boo, and later received a second Obie for Woman Before a Glass.

Her Broadway career reached a defining moment with Neil Simon's Lost in Yonkers in 1991, in which she played Bella Kurnitz, a mentally challenged aunt. The performance earned her both the Tony Award for Best Actress in a Play and the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Actress in a Play. She continued in the role during the production's national tour alongside co-star Mercedes McCambridge, and reprised Bella Kurnitz in the 1993 film adaptation. Two additional Broadway performances brought her Tony nominations: a Best Featured Actress in a Play nomination for the revival of Michael Cristofer's The Shadow Box in 1995, in which she played Beverly, and a Best Actress in a Play nomination for Edward Albee's The Goat, or Who Is Sylvia? in 2002, in which she played Stevie Gray. She also appeared on Broadway in The Rose Tattoo in 1995, The American Plan in 2009, and Torch Song in 2018. In The American Plan, a Manhattan Theatre Club production directed at the Samuel J. Friedman Theatre, she played Eva Adler in Richard Greenberg's play, with the limited engagement running from January 22 through March 22, 2009. Her role as Ma in Harvey Fierstein's Torch Song originated off-Broadway at Second Stage Theater, with previews beginning September 26 and an official opening on October 19, 2017, before the production transferred to Broadway.

On screen, Ruehl's film career spans four decades, beginning with The Warriors in 1979. Her most acclaimed film performance came in Terry Gilliam's 1991 fantasy comedy-drama The Fisher King, in which she played a video store owner and romantic interest. The role brought her the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress, a Golden Globe Award, the American Comedy Award, the Boston Society of Film Critics Award, and a Los Angeles Film Critics Association Award. Earlier, she had received the 1989 National Society of Film Critics Award for Best Supporting Actress for her work in Married to the Mob. Her other film credits include Heartburn (1986), 84 Charing Cross Road (1987), Big (1988), Last Action Hero (1993), Indictment: The McMartin Trial (1995), Roseanna's Grave (1997), Gia (1998), The Minus Man (1999), and Hustlers (2019). On television, she appeared in five episodes of the NBC sitcom Frasier from 1995 to 1996, playing KACL station manager Kate Costas, and had a major role in the television film All-American Girl: The Mary Kay Letourneau Story. She later played the mother of Vincent Chase on HBO's Entourage. In 2005, she and Esai Morales received the Rita Moreno HOLA Award for Excellence from the Hispanic Organization of Latin Actors. Ruehl is a faculty member at HB Studio in New York City.

In her personal life, Ruehl had a son, Christopher, whom she placed for adoption in 1976. They reunited in the late 1990s when he turned 21. In 1999, she married painter David Geiser, with whom she adopted a son, Jake, born in 1995. Christopher later became Jake's godfather. Ruehl and Geiser put their Hamptons home on the market in 2017, the same year she indicated they were no longer together, though they remained close. Geiser died of heart disease on October 14, 2020, at the age of 73. Her brother Peter relocated to Australia in 1987, where he worked as a newspaper columnist until his death in 2011.