Keri Russell

Keri Lynn Russell (born March 23, 1976) is a Golden Globe-winning American actress and dancer. After appearing in a number of made-for-television films and series during the mid-1990s, she came to fame for portraying the title role of Felicity Porter on the series Felicity, which ran from 1998 to 2002. Russell has since appeared in several films, including We Were Soldiers, The Upside of Anger, Mission: Impossible III, Waitress, and August Rush.

When Felicity ended, Russell took a break from acting. She moved to New York City and took two years off to avoid the business of Hollywood, spending time with friends. Russell subsequently made her off-Broadway stage debut in 2004, appearing opposite Jeremy Piven, Andrew McCarthy, and Ashlie Atkinson in Neil LaBute's Fat Pig. In 2005, she returned to television and film, beginning with an appearance in the Hallmark Hall of Fame television movie The Magic of Ordinary Days, theatrical film The Upside of Anger (alongside Kevin Costner, Joan Allen and Evan Rachel Wood), and the television miniseries Into the West.

Although a number of her Felicity co-stars went on to appear in producer J. J. Abrams' series, Alias, Russell declined invitations to be part of the show. In a seminar at the Museum of Television and Radio, Abrams said, "I've asked Keri if she would ever do it, and I usually get this, sort of like, giggle—and then she hangs up". In 2005, Abrams asked Russell to join the cast of Mission: Impossible III, a film he directed, and she accepted. The film was released on May 5, 2006. In the summer of 2006, Russell was chosen to be a celebrity spokeswoman for CoverGirl Cosmetics. Before she was in Mission Impossible: III she was screen tested for the role of "Lois Lane" in Superman Returns but lost the role to Kate Bosworth with whom she is co-starring in The Girl In The Park.

Russell has taped two episodes as a guest character on the NBC show Scrubs in 2007. She played Melody, a sorority sister and good friend of Elliot (Sarah Chalke). The first episode aired on April 26, and the second on May 3. Her most recent film role was in Waitress, a well-reviewed independent film in which she plays Jenna, a pregnant waitress in the American South; it was the fourth film in a row in which Russell had played a pregnant woman. The film opened on May 4, 2007 and Russell's performance was positively received by critics, with Michael Sragow of The Baltimore Sun writing that Russell's performance had "aesthetic character" and "welds tenderness and fierceness with quiet heat". In the summer of 2007, Russell appeared in The Keri Kronicles, a reality show/sitcom sponsored by CoverGirl and airing on MySpace; the show was filmed at Russell's home in Manhattan and spotlighted her life.

Russell next appeared in August Rush, a drama released in November of 2007. She also appeared on the cover of the cover of New York Post's Page Six Magazine On November 11, 2007. She has completed roles in Butterfly: A Grimm Love Story (titled Rohtenburg for its German release), in which she plays Katie Armstrong, a graduate student who writes a thesis paper on an infamous cannibal murder case, and the thriller The Girl In The Park, opposite Sigourney Weaver, Kate Bosworth and Alessandro Nivola.

Russell has recently joined the cast of Bedtime Stories with Adam Sandler playing the lead.

Russell has recently been confirmed to provide the voice of Wonder Woman in a direct to DVD animated feature to be released sometime in either late 2008 or early 2009.