Kirsten Dunst

Kirsten Caroline Dunst (born April 30, 1982) is an American-German actress. She gained recognition for her role as child vampire Claudia in the horror film Interview with the Vampire (1994), which earned her a Golden Globe nomination for Best Supporting Actress. She also had roles in her youth in Little Women (1994) and the fantasy films Jumanji (1995) and Small Soldiers (1998).

Career
Dunst began her career at age three as a child fashion model in television commercials. She was signed with Ford Models and Elite Model Management. At age six, she made her feature film debut with a minor role in Woody Allen's short film Oedipus Wrecks; it was released as one-third of the anthology film New York Stories (1989). Soon after, Dunst performed in the comedy-drama The Bonfire of the Vanities (1990), based on Tom Wolfe's novel of the same name, in which she played the daughter of Tom Hanks' character. In 1993, Dunst made a guest appearance in an episode of the science fiction drama Star Trek: The Next Generation.

Dunst's breakthrough role came in 1994, in the horror drama Interview with the Vampire opposite Tom Cruise and Brad Pitt, based on Anne Rice's novel of the same name. She played Claudia, the child vampire who is a surrogate daughter to Cruise's and Pitt's characters. The film included a scene in which Dunst shared her first onscreen kiss with Pitt, who is almost two decades her senior. She claimed that kissing him had made her feel uncomfortable: "I thought it was gross, that Brad had cooties. I mean, I was 10," she recalled. While the film overall received mixed reviews, many critics highlighted Dunst's performance. Roger Ebert considered her portrayal of Claudia to be one of the "creepier" aspects of the film, and took note of how well she had conveyed the impression of great age inside apparent youth. Todd McCarthy of Variety stated that Dunst was "just right" for the family. For her performance, she won the MTV Movie Award for Best Breakthrough Performance and the Saturn Award for Best Young Actress, in addition to receiving a Golden Globe Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress.

Later in 1994, Dunst co-starred in the drama film Little Women alongside Winona Ryder and Claire Danes. The film was critically acclaimed. Janet Maslin of The New York Times hailed it as the greatest adaptation of Louisa May Alcott's novel of the same name and wrote of Dunst's performance:

In 1995, Dunst starred in the fantasy adventure film Jumanji, a loose adaptation of Chris Van Allsburg's 1981 children's book of the same name. The story is about a supernatural and ominous board game in which animals and other jungle hazards appear with each roll of the dice. She was part of an ensemble cast that included Robin Williams, Bonnie Hunt and David Alan Grier. The film was a financial success and grossed $262 million worldwide. In that year, and again in 2002, Dunst was named one of People magazine's 50 Most Beautiful People.

From 1996 to 1997, Dunst had a recurring role in season three of the NBC medical drama ER. She played Charlie Chemingo, a child prostitute who was being cared for by the ER pediatrician Dr. Doug Ross (George Clooney). In 1997, she voiced Young Anastasia in the animated musical film Anastasia. Also in 1997, Dunst appeared in the black comedy film Wag the Dog, opposite Robert De Niro and Dustin Hoffman. The following year she voiced the title character, Kiki, a thirteen-year-old apprentice witch who leaves her home village to spend a year on her own, in the anime Kiki's Delivery Service. She also starred in Sarah Kernochan's period comedy All I Wanna Do (1998), playing a student at an all girls' boarding school in the 1960s, opposite Gaby Hoffmann, Rachael Leigh Cook, and Lynn Redgrave. Writing for The New York Times, A. O. Scott opined that "the film is surprisingly pleasant, thanks to smart, unstereotyped performances – especially by Hoffmann and Dunst – and the filmmaker's evident respect and affection for her characters".

Dunst turned down the role of Angela Hayes (played by Mena Suvari) in American Beauty (1999), because she did not want to appear in the film's sexual scenes or kiss the lead character, played by Kevin Spacey. She later explained: "When I read it, I was 15 and I don't think I was mature enough to understand the script's material." In that year, she co-starred in the comedy film Dick, opposite Michelle Williams; it is a parody which retells the events of the Watergate scandal that led to the resignation of former United States president Richard Nixon. Dunst's next film was Sofia Coppola's drama The Virgin Suicides (1999), based on Jeffrey Eugenides' novel of the same name. She played Lux Lisbon, one of the troubled teenage daughters of Ronald Lisbon (James Woods). The film was screened as a special presentation at the 43rd San Francisco International Film Festival in 2000. According to Metacritic, the film received generally favorable reviews. San Francisco Chronicle critic Peter Stack noted in his review that Dunst "beautifully balances innocence and wantonness". Dunst also appeared in Savage Garden's music video "I Knew I Loved You", the first single from their second and final album Affirmation (1999).

In 2000, Dunst starred in the comedy Bring It On as Torrance Shipman, the captain of a cheerleading squad. The film garnered mostly positive reviews, with many critics reserving praise for her performance. In his review, A. O. Scott called her "a terrific comic actress, largely because of her great expressive range, and the nimbleness with which she can shift from anxiety to aggression to genuine hurt". Charles Taylor of Salon noted that "among contemporary teenage actresses, Dunst has become the sunniest imaginable parodist", even though he thought the film had failed to provide her with as good a role as she had in either Dick or in The Virgin Suicides. Jessica Winter of The Village Voice praised Dunst, stating that her performance was "as sprightly and knowingly daft as her turn in Dick" adding that "[Dunst] provides the only major element of Bring It On that plays as tweaking parody rather than slick, strident, body-slam churlishness." Peter Stack of the San Francisco Chronicle, despite giving the film an unfavorable review, commended Dunst for her willingness "to be as silly and cloyingly agreeable as it takes to get through a slapdash film".

In 2002, Dunst starred opposite Tobey Maguire in the superhero film Spider-Man, the most financially successful film of her career up until this date. She played Mary Jane Watson, the best friend and love interest of Peter Parker (Maguire). The film was directed by Sam Raimi. Owen Gleiberman of Entertainment Weekly noted Dunst's ability to "lend even the smallest line a tickle of flirtatious music". Writing for the Los Angeles Times, Kenneth Turan reviewed that Dunst and Maguire made a real connection onscreen, concluding that their relationship "involved audiences to an extent rarely seen in films". Spider-Man was a critical and commercial success. The film grossed $114 million during its opening weekend in North America and earned $822 million worldwide.

Dunst next co-starred with Billy Bob Thornton, Morgan Freeman and Holly Hunter in the drama Levity (2003), a story of a man who is released on parole and returns to his hometown seeking redemption. That same year, she co-starred opposite Julia Roberts, Maggie Gyllenhaal and Julia Stiles in the drama Mona Lisa Smile (2003). The film received mostly negative reviews, with Manohla Dargis of the Los Angeles Times describing it as "smug and reductive". Dunst co-starred as Mary Svevo opposite Jim Carrey, Kate Winslet and Tom Wilkinson in Michel Gondry's science fiction romantic comedy-drama Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004). The latter film was critically acclaimed, with Entertainment Weekly describing Dunst's subplot as "nifty and clever". The film grossed $72 million worldwide.

The success of the first Spider-Man led Dunst to reprise her role as Mary Jane Watson in 2004 in Spider-Man 2. The film was acclaimed by critics and a commercial success, setting a new opening weekend box office record for North America. With box office revenues of $783 million worldwide, it was the second highest-grossing film in 2004. Also in 2004, Dunst co-starred opposite Paul Bettany in the romantic comedy Wimbledon in which she portrayed a rising tennis player in the Wimbledon Championships, while Bettany portrayed a fading former tennis star. The film received mixed reviews, but many critics enjoyed Dunst's performance. Claudia Puig of USA Today observed that the chemistry between Dunst and Bettany was potent, with Dunst doing a "fine job as a sassy and self-assured player".

In Dunst's sole project of 2005, she co-starred opposite Orlando Bloom in Cameron Crowe's romantic tragicomedy Elizabethtown as flight attendant Claire Colburn. The film premiered at the 2005 Toronto International Film Festival. Dunst revealed that working with Crowe was enjoyable, but more demanding than she had expected. The film garnered mixed reviews, with the Chicago Tribune rating it 1 out of 4 stars and describing Dunst's portrayal of a flight attendant as "cloying". It was also a box office disappointment. After Elizabethtown, Dunst collaborated with Sofia Coppola again and starred as the title character in the historical drama Marie Antoinette (2006), based on Antonia Fraser's book Marie Antoinette: The Journey. The film was screened at a special presentation at the 2006 Cannes Film Festival, and was reviewed favorably. The film grossed $60 million at the box office from a budget of $40 million.

In 2007, Dunst reprised the role of Mary Jane Watson in Spider-Man 3. In contrast to its predecessors' rave reviews, Spider-Man 3 received a mixed reaction from critics. Ryan Gilbey of the New Statesman was critical of Dunst's character, remarking that "the film-makers couldn't come up with much for Mary Jane to do other than scream a lot". Nevertheless, with a worldwide gross of $891 million, it stands as the most commercially successful film in the series and Dunst's highest-grossing film to the end of 2008. Having initially signed on for three Spider-Man films, she said she would consider doing a fourth, but only if Raimi and Maguire returned. In January 2010, it was announced that the fourth film was canceled and that the Spider-Man film series would be restarted, therefore dropping the trio from the franchise.

Dunst's next role was in 2008, in which she co-starred opposite Simon Pegg in the comedy How to Lose Friends & Alienate People, based on former Vanity Fair contributing editor Toby Young's memoir of the same name. Review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes gave the film an approval rating of 37%, with the film gaining mostly negative reviews. Robert Wilonsky of The Village Voice was critical of Dunst's performance, writing she "seems to be speaking in four different accents at once, none of them quite of the English variety". He added that the film "plays like a made-for-CBS redo of The Devil Wears Prada".

Hossein Amini's The Two Faces of January (2014) was Dunst's next major role, starring alongside Viggo Mortensen and Oscar Isaac. Playing Colette MacFarland, the wife of a con artist, the thriller is based on Patricia Highsmith's 1964 novel of the same name. Garnering mostly favorable reviews, the Los Angeles Times complimented the 1960s Greek setting and observed Dunst "brings a potent complexity to Colette; every mood shift registers to the bone". Jake Wilson of The Sydney Morning Herald praised the script for "condensing the book's plot while retaining its spirit", although he thought there was some uneven editing. Of Dunst's performance, he called her "typically teasing yet sympathetic". Finally in 2014, Dunst voiced a character in the eighth episode of Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey, and made a guest appearance in an episode of Portlandia. Throughout 2015, Dunst focused solely on television work. She was cast as hairdresser Peggy Blumquist in the second season of the critically acclaimed FX crime comedy-drama Fargo, which earned her a nomination for Golden Globe Award for Best Actress.

In 2016, Dunst co-starred in Jeff Nichols' science fiction drama Midnight Special with Michael Shannon and Joel Edgerton. The story is about a father and his eight-year-old son who go on the run upon discovering that the boy possesses mysterious powers. The film opened to mostly positive reviews; Tim Grierson of The New Republic was impressed by Midnight Special 's special effects which imitated a late 20th century retro style. However, he questioned the purpose of Dunst's character which "simply has nothing to do". Dunst had a supporting role in the biographical drama Hidden Figures (2016), a loose adaptation of the book of the same name, about African-American mathematicians who worked at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) during the Space Race. Dunst's portrayal of a white supervisor drew praise from Slant Magazine 's Elise Nakhnikian, while The Guardian thought the film was educational and entertaining despite its underdeveloped supporting cast. The film was a commercial success, grossing $236 million worldwide and was nominated for three Academy Awards. The cast also won the Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Motion Picture. In addition to acting, Dunst served as a member of the main competition jury of the 2016 Cannes Film Festival. In that year, Dunst planned to direct an adaptation of Sylvia Plath's novel The Bell Jar, starring Dakota Fanning, but stepped down from the project before production.

Dunst then starred in the psychological thriller Woodshock, written and directed by her friends, Kate and Laura Mulleavy, founders of the Rodarte fashion label. The film is about a woman who falls deeper into paranoia after taking a deadly drug. The Mulleavys' personally approached Dunst for the lead role, which gave Dunst an "emotional safety net" during filming. She prepared for the role over the course of a year, undertaking dream experiments in order to try to inhabit the character's state of mind. Upon release, the film was unpopular with critics. Katie Rife of The A.V. Club acknowledged the "sophisticated" cinematography but thought "Character development and motivation are practically nonexistent, and the already-thin plot pushes ambiguity to the point of incoherence". Variety 's Guy Lodge shared a similar opinion with the character, writing "Dunst has form in playing irretrievably inverted depression to riveting effect, but the Mulleavys’ script hardly gives her as complex an emotional or intellectual palette to work with".

In 2019, Dunst starred in the Showtime dark comedy television series On Becoming a God in Central Florida, which premiered in August that year. For her role, she was nominated for a Golden Globe for Best Actress and a Critics Choice Award for Best Actress in a Comedy Series. In September 2019, Showtime renewed the series for a second season, but ultimately canceled it the following year due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Dunst will next star in Jane Campion's film The Power of the Dog for Netflix.

Animated Films

 * The Snow Queen (1957) - Gerda (Jove Dub)
 * Alice & the Mystery of the Third Planet (1981) - Alice
 * Kaena: The Prophecy (2003) - Kaena

Anime Films

 * Kiki's Delivery Service (1989) - Kiki (Buena Vista Dub)