Oscar Profile: Meryl Streep Revisited

Born June 22, 1949 in Summit, New Jersey to Mary, a commercial artist, and William Streep, Jr., a pharmaceutical executive, Mary Louise (Meryl) Streep’s early performing ambitions tended toward opera. Raised in New Jersey, she received her BA cum laude from Vasser in 1971, and her MBA from Yale Drama School in 1975.

Streep’s first professional role was in the 1975 Broadway revival of Trelawney of the Wells. She appeared in several more Broadway productions including the 1977 revivals of The Cherry Orchard and Happy End. She made her film debut in a bit part in 1977’s Julia.

Then living with actor John Cazale, she was cast in The Deer Hunter in which Cazale also had a role in support of Robert De Niro. By the time the film was released at the end of 1978, Cazale had died and Streep had married sculptor Don Gummer. The film was a huge success, resulting in Oscar nominations for De Niro and Streep and wins for Best Picture, Director (Michael Cimino), Supporting Actor (Christopher Walken), and two others.

In the meantime, Streep starred in the 1978 TV mini-series, Holocaust which was nominated for 15 Emmys and won 8 including one for Streep for Best Actress.

1979’s Kramer vs. Kramer was a successive Best Picture Oscar-winner for Streep, and the first for which she herself won. She received a second nomination two years later for The French Lieutenant’s Woman and a fourth for the following year’s Sophie’s Choice for which she won her own second Oscar.

The 1980s were a busy time for the four-time mother who received further Oscar nominations during the decade for Silkwood, Out of Africa (her third Oscar-winning Best Picture), Ironweed, and A Cry in the Dark. The 1990s were just as busy, bringing her additional Oscar nominations for Postcards from the Edge, The Bridges of Madison County, One True Thing, and Music of the Heart. She now equaled Katharine Hepburn’s record of twelve Oscar nominations. She would overtake the legendary Hepburn’s record with her nomination for 2002’s Adaptation early in 2003, the year in which Hepburn died at 96.

It was time for Streep to start receiving lifetime achievement awards. She was awarded the AFI Life Achievement Award in 2004, given a Gala Tribute from the Film Society of Lincoln Center in 2008, awarded the National Medal of Honor in 2010, given a Kennedy Center Honor in 2011, awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2014, and the Golden Globe Cecil B. DeMille Award in 2017.

By 2018, she had a total of 21 Oscar nominations and the same number of AARP Movies for Grown-ups Awards nominations, the first of which she received for Adaptation.

Streep’s more frequent Oscar nods were for The Devil Wears Prada, Doubt, Julie & Julia, The Iron Lady (for which she won for the third time), August: Osage County, Into the Woods, Florence Foster Jenkins, and The Post.

Next up for the 76-year-old living legend is The Devil Wears Prada 2, 19 years after the original.

ESSENTIAL FILMS

KRAMER VS. KRAMER (1979), directed by Robert Benton

Streep won her first Oscar for her portrayal of a career-oriented wife who leaves her husband and 8-year-old son and then returns to battle her husband in courts for custody. It was the actress’ second nomination and second Oscar-winner for Best Picture following the previous year’s The Deer Hunter. A cultural phenomenon, it won a total of five Oscars including Best Actor (Dustin Hoffman), Director, and Screenplay (both for Robert Benton). Justin Henry as the precocious son and Jane Alexander as a concerned neighbor were nominated as were the film’s cinematography and editing.

SOPHIE’S CHOICE (1982), directed by Alan J. Pakula

Streep won her second Oscar for what many consider her greatest performance and one of the greatest performances of any actress. She plays a concentration camp survivor haunted by the memory of having to choose between life for one of her children and death for the other upon her arrival at Auschwitz. She chooses life for her son and death for her daughter but never learns what happened to her son. Kevin Kline is her morose lover in the present and Peter MacNicol is the young writer she befriends. Hers was the only Oscar for the film out of five nominations that included adapted screenplay, cinematography, costume design and score.

OUT OF AFRICA (1985), directed by Sydney Pollack

Streep’s third and final Best Picture Oscar winner provided her with her own sixth Oscar nomination. Nominated for 11 Oscars, it won 7 for Best Director, Adapted Screenplay, Art Direction – Set Decoration, Sound, and Score as well as Best Picture. It also received nominations for Best Supporting Actor (Klaus Maria Brandaur), Film Editing, and Costume Design. The film was based on the life of Danish writer Karen Blixen’s time in Africa with Robert Redford as a daredevil pilot in the days following World War I and Brandauer as her cuckhold husband who gave her syphilis.

DOUBT (2008), directed by John Patrick Shanley

Streep was an early favorite to win a third Oscar for her portrayal of the iron-willed Catholic nun and principal of her school who accuses the parish priest (Philip Seymour Hoffman) of molesting one of the boys in the school in this adaptation of writer-director Shanley’s Pulitzer Prizewinning play. Hoffman as the priest, Amy Adams as a young nun, and Viola Davis as the mother of the boy were also Oscar nominated as was Shanley for his adapted screenplay. Streep lost the Oscar to Kate Winslet who was heavily campaigned for Best Supporting Actress for The Reader but voters nominated her in lead instead.

THE IRON LADY (2011), directed by Phyllida Law

Streep finally won her third Oscar 29 years after her second for her portrayal of an elderly Margaret Thatcher, Britain’s controversial first female prime minister, in a neck-to-neck race with Viola Davis in The Help. The film meanders back and forth between the present in which Thatcher has imaginary conversations with her late husband (Jim Broadbent) to the dismay of her daughter (Olivia Colman) and the lady in her glory days. The film also won an Oscar for its make-up. It became the second film following Ed Wood to be nominated for Oscars for a single performance and makeup, the first to win both.

MERYL STREEP AND OSCAR

The Deer Hunter (1978) – nominated – Best Supporting Actress

Kramer vs. Kramer (1979) – Oscar – Best Supporting Actress

The French Lieutenant’s Woman (1981) – nominated – Best Actress

Sophie’s Choice (1982) – Oscar – Best Actress

Silkwood (1983) – nominated – Best Actress

Out of Africa (1985) – nominated – Best Actress

Ironweed (1987) – nominated – Best Actress

A Cry in the Dark (1988) – nominated – Best Actress

Postcards from the Edge (1990) – nominated – Best Actress

The Bridges of Madison County (1995) – nominated – Best Actress

One True Thing (1998) – nominated – Best Actress