Sigourney Weaver

Susan Alexandra Weaver was born in New York City on October 8, 1949, the daughter of English actress Elizabeth Inglis (1913–2007) and American television executive Pat Weaver (1908–2002). Her father served as president of NBC from 1953 to 1955, during which time he created The Today Show. Pat's brother, Doodles Weaver, was a comedian and contributor to Mad. She is of Dutch, English, Scots-Irish, and Scottish descent through her father. At the age of 14, Weaver began using the name "Sigourney" after she took it from a minor character in The Great Gatsby. She briefly attended the Brearley School and Chapin School in New York before arriving at the Ethel Walker School in Simsbury, Connecticut, where she developed an early interest in performing. One of her early roles was in a school adaptation of the poem "The Highwayman", and on another occasion she played a Rudolph Valentino character in an adaptation of The Sheik. She was also involved in theatrical productions of A Streetcar Named Desire and You Can't Take It with You during one summer in Southbury, Connecticut. Known for her height, she reportedly reached 180 cm (5 ft 11 in) by the age of 11, which had a negative impact on her self-esteem; she recalled feeling like "a giant spider" and never having "the confidence to ever think [she] could act". In 1967, shortly before turning 18, Weaver visited Israel and volunteered on a kibbutz for several months. Upon returning to the United States, she attended Sarah Lawrence College. After her freshman year, she transferred to Stanford University as an English major. At Stanford, she was extensively involved in theater. She performed with a group in Palo Alto named The Company, doing Shakespeare plays and "commedia dell'arte in a covered wagon" around the Bay Area, the nature of which she considered "outrageous". She "dressed like an elf and lived in a tree house" and avoided Stanford's drama department as she believed their productions were too "stuffy" and "safe". She had planned to enter Stanford's Ph.D. English program and eventually pursue a career as a writer or a journalist, but changed her mind after getting frustrated by the "deadly dry" honors courses. She eventually graduated in 1972 with a BA in English. She subsequently applied to the Yale School of Drama, performing Bertolt Brecht's Saint Joan of the Stockyards at her audition, and was accepted. Weaver admitted that she had a difficult time at Yale. She was not fond of the shows at Yale Repertory Theatre, and had little luck getting lead roles in school productions. Some of her acting teachers referred to her as "talentless" and advised her to stick to comedy. She later said she pulled through due to her time at the Yale Cabaret, and with the help of friends such as Christopher Durang, who kept casting her in his plays. She graduated from Yale with an MFA in 1974.