Joey Lauren Adams

Date of birth: January 9, 1968
Astrological Zodiac sign: Capricorn
Age: 44

Joey Lauren Adams is an American actress who has appeared in over 30 films. She is perhaps best known for her roles in the films of Kevin Smith, particularly Chasing Amy.

Adams was born in North Little Rock, Arkansas. Her father was a lumber yard owner. She moved to Hollywood in 1988.

Adams's first movie breakthrough role came in 1993 in Richard Linklater's Dazed and Confused, a film which also starred Ben Affleck and Matthew McConaughey. She was in the film Mallrats which was her first Kevin Smith movie. After that, she did another Smith movie playing Alyssa Jones in the 1997 film Chasing Amy, opposite Ben Affleck. This role brought her a lot of attention for her portrayal of a lesbian who falls for a man. Director Kevin Smith wrote and directed the film, which was largely inspired by his relationship with Adams herself.

Her performance earned her both the 1997 Chicago Film Critics Award and Las Vegas Film Critics Society Award for "Most Promising Actress" and a Golden Globe nomination for Best Performance by an Actress in a Motion Picture—Comedy/Musical. Adams also contributed the song "Alive" to the soundtrack of Chasing Amy, performing it in one of the scenes of the film. She also has appeared in two other View Askew productions, Mallrats (1995) and Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back (2001) briefly reprising the role of Chasing Amy's Alyssa in the latter. She reprised the role again, in voice form only, for Clerks: The Lost Scene, featured on the Clerks X DVD.

After having the female lead in the successful Adam Sandler film, Big Daddy, she would go on to appear in many smaller films including Beautiful and In the Shadows.

Some speculation has been made that her unusual speaking voice hampered her chances of Hollywood stardom, to which she has commented: "It's not a normal voice. It doesn't fit into people's preconceptions about what a woman's voice should sound like. My mom doesn't think I have an unusual voice, though. I'm sure it's helped me get some roles. But Chasing Amy I almost didn't get. There was concern the voice would grate on some people, which some critics said it did."

In 2005, she had a guest role in an episode of TV show Veronica Mars. During 2006, Adams released her directorial debut, Come Early Morning, starring Ashley Judd, Jeffrey Donovan, Diane Ladd, Tim Blake Nelson and Laura Prepon. The film, shot on location in Little Rock and North Little Rock, was selected for the 2006 Sundance Film Festival.

Adams shares her hometown with another Hollywood actress, Mary Steenburgen. Currently, she resides in Oxford, Mississippi.

In a 1997 article by planetout.com, she is reported to have said, "I'm bisexual, and I realized that when I went to Bali where the culture there is very bisexual, and it is the first time I was very attracted to women. I have a lot of friends who are [that way]; in fact, most". While more recently, in a 2006 interview with suicidegirls.com, she stated, "I'm not bisexual but I've seen on the internet that it says that. It's a rumor."

See also:  Actress,  American