Lisa Kudrow
could not be further from the character she plays on the hit
NBC sitcom Friends, ditzy New Age musician/masseuse/taxi driver,
Phoebe Buffay. For starters, the character she plays is in
her twenties, while Lisa was born July 30th, 1963, in Encino,
California. While Phoebe only discovered her biological parents
a couple of years ago, Lisa comes from a secure household,
where she was raised in Tarzana, California.
Lisa's father Lee Kudrow is
a renowned headache specialist, while her mother Nedra Kudrow
is a travel agent. Although Lisa was a hard worker and studied
intensely while in elementary school, she started to show
an interest in acting at an early age. She would lip sync
to the soundtrack form Fiddler on the Roof, pretending to
be one of the musical's characters. Lisa performed her Fiddler
routine in several classes, a teacher caught a glimpse of
her act and was fully impressed.
After graduating from William
Howard Taft High School in 1981, where Lisa played tennis
on her free time, she attended Vassar College in New York
where she majored in Biology. When she graduated in 1985,
Lisa initially hoped to pursue a career in medical research
and returned to Los Angeles to work with her father.
As luck would have it, comedian
Jon Lovitz, a friend of Lisa's brother's, had just been cast
on Saturday Night Live which reawakened the little girl in
her who loved to act. Lovitz encouraged Lisa to audition for
the improvisational-comedy troupe the Groundlings, to follow
her real passion in life: performing. She was referred to
a well-known improvisation teacher after having been rejected
for the Groundlings, but in 1989, she finally became an official
member of the Groundlings team.
After gaining experience and
recognition as a member of the popular comedy troupe, Lisa
landed a role in a small production called The Ladies Room.
Her next move as a comedienne was on the small screen with
appearances on shows such as Cheers, Coach, Newhart, Life
Goes On, and The Simpsons.
In 1993, Lisa received the
role that ultimately led to her Emmy winning role as Phoebe
on Friends. She was cast as Ursula, the ditzy waitress on
the NBC sitcom Mad About You. NBC was so impressed with her
performance, that they encouraged her to audition for a more
substantial part on another NBC show.
She tried out for the part
of Roz on Frazier, but was turned down as the role did not
suit Lisa's character. But the role of Phoebe fits Lisa like
a charm, so much so that people probably think that that's
how she is in real life. Phoebe Buffay is actually the twin
sister of Ursula Buffay, Lisa's Mad About You character, which
Lisa continued to play.
Lisa can add roles in the
following movies to her resume: Romy and Michele's High School
Reunion, Clockwatchers, The Opposite of Sex, 1999's Analyze
This, co-starring Robert De Niro, and Hanging Up, also starring
the beautiful Meg Ryan.
One of People Magazine's Most
Beautiful Women in the World in 1997, Lisa has received a
lot of recognition for her acting skills, including the Screen
Actor's Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by a Female
Actor in a Comedy Series for her role on Friends, an Independent
Spirit Award Nomination for her role in The Opposite of Sex
and a nomination for an American Comedy Award for her role
in Analyze This. This broad recognition shows that Lisa is
not typecast as the flaky girl she plays on Friends.
Lisa and her husband Michael
Stern have a son Julian Murray. She can still be seen every
Thursday night on Friends with her fellow beautiful cast mates,
Courteney Cox Arquette and Jennifer Aniston.
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