JoBeth Williams Biography

A graduate of Brown University, JoBeth Williams launched her acting career on the East Coast repertory theater circuit. Williams made her Broadway bow in 1980's A Coupla White Chicks Sitting Around Talking and gained a TV following as a regular on the daytime serials The Guiding Light and Somerset. She made an impressible film debut in a "flash part" in the Oscar-winning Kramer vs. Kramer (1979). Williams' star ascended with such roles as the mother of long-suffering Heather O'Rourke in the first two Poltergeist films and the sixties activist-cum-housewife in The Big Chill (1983). While she hasn't always been well-served by Hollywood, she has managed to show up in a number of worthwhile assignments, ranging from 1984's Teachers (in which she spontaneously performing the most dramatically justifiable striptease in movie history) to 1994's Wyatt Earp (as Bessie Earp) Her TV-movie credits are even more impressive: she had several memorable moments in the post-apocalyptic The Day After (1983) and was brilliant as the anguished mother of the murdered title character in Adam (1983). She has also participated in series television, lending her voice to the character of Angel in the animated nighttimer Fish Police (1992) and essaying the Susan Sarandon role in the 1995 weekly TV adaptation of The Client. In addition, she served as executive producer of the 1991 TV movie Bump in the Night, and as co-producer of the Oscar-nominated documentary On Hope (1994). JoBeth Williams is married to director John Pasquin. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

• 1. Stu: Am I nuts Edith?
  2. Edith: Are you asking me as a therapist, or as a wife?
  3. Stu: Which one is cheaper?
  From The Big Year. Submitted by Chris P (8 months ago)

• 1. Steve: Look, something's funny going on here next door. Something.
  2. Diane: We were wondering if maybe you had experienced any disturbances.
  3. Tuthill: What kind of disturbances?
  4. Diane: Oh, you know, like dishes or furniture moving around by themselves.
  From Poltergeist. Submitted by Gregg G (10 months ago)

• 1. Diane: Now reach back into our past when you used to have an open mind, remember that? Just try to use that for the next couple of minutes.
  From Poltergeist. Submitted by Gregg G (10 months ago)

• 1. Diane: It's like another side nature, that you and I aren't qualified to understand. When you overreact, it makes what happened much to important.
  From Poltergeist. Submitted by Gregg G (10 months ago)