About Me
Naomi Watts career began in Australian television, where she appeared in commercials and television melodramas such as Home and Away and Brides of Christ. She was featured in a supporting role in the acclaimed 1991 Australian indie film Flirting, which starred future Hollywood up-and-comers Nicole Kidman and Thandie Newton. As Watts made the transition from Australia to the United States, she landed a supporting role in the cult 1995 film Tank Girl, playing the part of "Jet Girl."Finding quality roles at first proved difficult for Watts in the Hollywood system, as she appeared in the short-lived series Sleepwalkers and numerous B-list productions such as films like Children of the Corn IV. Gradually, Watts garnered supporting roles such as Dangerous Beauty.However it wasn't until 2001 , when Watts caught the attention of critics and audiences as she appeared in David Lynch's highly acclaimed Mulholland Drive. The film, which premiered at the 2001 Cannes Film Festival, won Watts high praise. She won the National Society of Film Critics Award as Best Actress and the National Board of Review award as Breakthrough Performance of the year. Watts worked with director/screenwriter Scott Coffey on Lynch's Mulholland Dr., where Watts had her breakout performance. Her next film, the semi-autobiographical Ellie Parker, grew out of the friendship forged between Watts and Coffey. Soon after the quality and importance of Watts' roles improved and quickly shot the actress to the top of the Hollywood A-list. In 2002, she starred in one of the biggest box office hits of that year, the English language remake of the Japanese horror film, The Ring. The following year, she starred in the film Ned Kelly opposite Heath Ledger, Orlando Bloom, and Geoffrey Rush; as well as the Merchant-Ivory film Le Divorce with Kate Hudson. It was her performance opposite Sean Penn and Benicio Del Toro in director Alejandro González Iñárritu's 21 Grams that earned Watts her first Academy Award nomination as Best Actress.Since then Watts has been one of the most in-demand actresses. She produced and starred in the well-received independent picture We Don't Live Here Anymore. She reunited with Sean Penn and Don Cheadle in The Assassination of Richard Nixon, teamed up with Jude Law and Dustin Hoffman in David O. Russell's ensemble I ♥ Huckabees, and starred in the sequel to the Ring, The Ring Two. Aside from balancing both independent projects as Ellie Parker, she managed to star in the biggest remake of them all, 2005's King Kong. The role, which was immortalized by Fay Wray in the original, proved to be Watts' most commercial film yet. Directed by The Lord of the Rings director Peter Jackson, the film won high praise and grossed $550 million worldwide.Watts starred in The Painted Veil with Edward Norton and Liev Schreiber, released in December 2006. She has since finished the films Funny Games (a remake of a German movie) with Tim Roth and Eastern Promises with Viggo Mortensen.In May 2006, Watts was named a special representative to the U.N. program for HIV/AIDS.In May 2007, many newspaper articles and online publishers claimed she had signed up to play Narcissa Malfoy in the upcoming Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince scheduled for release on November 28, 2008.
Naomi Watts was awarded the Montecito Award by the Santa Barbara International Film Festival.
