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Christine Lahti was born on this day in 1950

Word of the Day – Thursday, April 4th

 


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LAHTI

American actress and film director
Common clues:
Actress Christine; Christine of “Chicago Hope”; Emmy winner Christine; Christine of “Running on Empty”; “Swing Shift” Oscar nominee
Crossword puzzle frequency: 2 times a year
Video:
Golden Globes 1998


I don't want to fight aging; I want to take good care of myself, but plastic surgery and all that? I'm not interested. – Christine Lahti


Christine Lahti (born April 4, 1950) is an American actress and film director.



Lahti was born in Birmingham, Michigan, the daughter of Elizabeth Margaret (née Tabar), a painter, homemaker and nurse, and Paul Theodore Lahti, a surgeon. Lahti has Finnish ancestry. Her surname means "a gulf", "a bay" or "a cove" in Finnish and Lahti is also a city in Finland. Lahti studied fine arts at Florida State University and received her bachelor's degree in drama from the University of Michigan, where she joined Delta Gamma sorority. She then toured Europe as part of a pantomime acting troupe.


After college, Lahti headed to New York City, where she worked as a waitress and did commercials. Her breakthrough movie was …And Justice for All (1979) with Al Pacino. After starring in a few hits in the 1970s and early 1980s, Lahti chose roles that allows her to spend time with her three children.[citation needed] She has also focused on television, beginning with her role in the 1979 made-for-TV adaptation of The Executioner's Song. She appeared on Broadway in Wendy Wasserstein's seriocomic play, The Heidi Chronicles.


Lahti received an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress for Swing Shift in 1984, and won an Academy Award for Best Short Film, Live Action for Lieberman in Love (1995), in which she starred and directed. Adapted from a short story by W.P. Kinsella, "Lieberman in Love", the Oscar win came as a surprise to the author, who, watching the award telecast from home, had no idea the film had been made and released. He had not been listed in the film's credits, and was not acknowledged by director Christine Lahti in her acceptance speech.[citation needed]


She won an Emmy and a Golden Globe for her role in Chicago Hope. When her Golden Globe win was announced at the ceremony there was a long pause as Lahti was not coming up and no one could find her. Robin Williams rushed on stage and began pretending to be Lahti. When she eventually got on stage she explained that she had been in the bathroom.[citation needed] She later made it a point to be good-humored about the incident, usually poking fun at herself at other awards shows.

At the Governor's Ball held after the 49th Annual Emmy Awards, 1997In 2001, her first directorial film, My First Mister, was released. Starring Leelee Sobieski and Albert Brooks, the movie debuted with good reviews. In DVD commentary she applauds the work of her cast and crew, remarking "[I] was very lucky to have such a wonderful crew..." She did feel regret that the film was rated R, for language, despairing that the movie might not be viewed by teenagers who would like and relate with the characters. Also, Lahti mentioned several times that she would have liked to have more time to shoot different perspectives in order to facilitate story arc.



Lahti starred in the Executive ADA role on Law & Order: Special Victims Unit as Sonya Paxton, while the character Alexandra Cabot (Stephanie March) was in appeals. She was in the first four episodes of the 11th season and returned for the show's eighth episode, where she clashed with Alexandra Cabot. Lahti later guest starred in the ninth and seventeenth episode of the 12th season where she reprised her role as Executive ADA Sonya Paxton.


She returned to Broadway upon joining the cast of the Tony Award-winning play God of Carnage on November 17, 2009, replacing actress Marcia Gay Harden. Both actresses had a few special appearances on Law & Order: Special Victims Unit.



This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Christine_Lahti".