Ellen Page

Ellen Philpotts-Page (born February 21, 1987), known professionally as Ellen Page, is a Canadian actress. She started her career in Canada with roles in the television shows Pit Pony, Trailer Park Boys, and ReGenesis. Page ventured into films, winning attention after starring in the 2005 drama Hard Candy, before her breakthrough role as Juno (2007). Her other notable film roles have been in X-Men: The Last Stand (2006), Smart People (2008), Whip It (2009), Super (2010), Inception (2010) and X-Men: Days of Future Past (2014), as well as providing the voice acting, motion capture and likeness for Jodie Holmes in the video game Beyond: Two Souls (2013).

For her role in Jason Reitman's comedy film Juno, Page received Academy Award, BAFTA, Golden Globe and Screen Actors Guild Best Actress nominations, and won the Independent Spirit Award for her performance.

an id="Early_life">Early life

Page was born and raised in Halifax, Nova Scotia, the daughter of Martha Philpotts, a teacher, and Dennis Page, a graphic designer. She attended the Halifax Grammar School until grade 10, spent some time at Queen Elizabeth High School, and graduated from the Shambhala School in 2005. She also spent two years in Toronto, Ontario studying in the Interact Program at Vaughan Road Academy, along with close friend and fellow Canadian actor Mark Rendall. Growing up, Page enjoyed playing with action figures and climbing trees.

Career

Page first acted in front of the camera in 1997, at age ten, in the CBC television movie Pit Pony, which later spun off into a television series. This led to more roles in a number of small Canadian films and television series, notably playing Treena Lahey in season two of Trailer Park Boys. At 16, she was cast in Mouth to Mouth, an independent film shot in Europe. Page starred in the 2005 movie Hard Candy and gained praise for "one of the most complex, disturbing and haunting performances of the year." She also appeared in X-Men: The Last Stand as Katherine "Kitty" Pryde / Shadowcat, a girl who can walk through walls. In the previous X-Men movies, the part had been used in brief cameos played by other actresses, but never as a main character.

As the title character in Juno, Page garnered substantial praise; A. O. Scott of The New York Times noted her as being "frighteningly talented" and Roger Ebert said, "Has there been a better performance this year than Ellen Page's creation of Juno? I do not think so." Page was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actress, but lost to Marion Cotillard in La Vie en Rose. The role, however, did win her more than 20 awards, including a Canadian Comedy Award, an Independent Spirit Award, and a Satellite Award. Page also co-starred in Smart People, which premiered at the 2008 Sundance Film Festival. Shot before Juno, but released afterwards, the film saw her playing overachieving daughter to Dennis Quaid‍‍ '​‍s college professor character. Page's other film credits include An American Crime, which premiered at the 2007 Sundance Film Festival; The Tracey Fragments, which was released in November 2007 in Canada and May 2008 in the U.S.; and The Stone Angel.

In 2007, she was attached to play the title character in an adaptation of Charlotte Brontë‍‍ '​‍s Jane Eyre and had planned to work on an as-yet unmade film entitled Jack and Diane opposite Olivia Thirlby, with whom she co-starred in Juno but it was announced in August 2009 that her role in Jack and Diane would be played by the actress Alison Pill. Before his death in January 2008, Heath Ledger had discussed with Page the idea of starring in his directorial debut, The Queen's Gambit.

In 2008, she was ranked #86 on FHM‍‍ '​‍s Sexiest Women in the World list, and placed at #93 for 2009. In June 2008, Page was listed in Entertainment Weekly‍‍ '​‍s future A-List stars list. Page hosted Saturday Night Live on March 1, 2008. On May 3, 2009, she guest starred in the episode "Waverly Hills 9-0-2-1-D'oh" of the animated series The Simpsons as a character named Alaska Nebraska, a parody of Hannah Montana. She also starred in Drew Barrymore's directorial debut, Whip It, alongside Juliette Lewis, Marcia Gay Harden, Drew Barrymore and Kristen Wiig. The film premiered at the 2009 Toronto International Film Festival and had its wide release on October 2, 2009.

She features in Michael Lander's film Peacock, opposite Cillian Murphy, Susan Sarandon, Bill Pullman and Josh Lucas, which was released in 2010 despite an original release date of 2009. In August 2009, Page began shooting the big-budget Christopher Nolan thriller Inception, alongside co-stars Leonardo DiCaprio, Marion Cotillard, Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Ken Watanabe. The film was released on July 16, 2010. She has starred in the film Super, and will reportedly play Stacie Andree in an upcoming film about Laurel Hester.

As of 2010, she serves as a spokesperson for Cisco Systems in a series of advertisements, appearing in three commercials set in Lunenburg, Nova Scotia. On May 26, 2010, it was reported in a column on "Deadline Hollywood" and by Entertainment Weekly that Page will star in the new HBO series Tilda alongside Diane Keaton, who plays the title role. Tilda is based on the life of Nikki Finke, the founder of the influential Hollywood blog, DeadlineHollywood.com. Tilda was reportedly dropped by HBO due to friction between the creators. She is also the narrator of the documentary on colony collapse disorder, Vanishing of the Bees, directed by Maryam Henein.

In April 2011, it was announced that Page would co-star in the Woody Allen film To Rome with Love alongside Jesse Eisenberg, Penélope Cruz, and Alec Baldwin. In June 2012, Quantic Dream announced a video game entitled Beyond: Two Souls in which Page and Willem Dafoe portray the protagonists Jodie Holmes and Nathan Dawkins, respectively. It was released on October 8, 2013, in North America. Page reprised her role as Katherine "Kitty" Pryde in X-Men: Days of Future Past (2014). In February 2013, Page confirmed that her directorial debut will be titled Miss Stevens and will star Anna Faris. The script is written by Julia Hart and will be produced by Gary Gilbert, Jordan Horowitz and Doug Wald. In December 2014 Page portrayed Han Solo in a staged reading of Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back.

Page is starring in a new film Tallulah alongside her Juno costar, Allison Janney.

Personal life

In 2008, Page was one of 30 celebrities who participated in an online ad series for U.S. Campaign for Burma, calling for an end to the military dictatorship in Burma. She describes herself as a pro-choice feminist. She attended Buddhist school in her youth and practiced meditation and yoga. She practices a vegan lifestyle, and PETA named her and Jared Leto the Sexiest Vegetarians of 2014.

On February 14, 2014, Page came out as gay in a speech at the Human Rights Campaign's "Time to Thrive" conference. In 2014, Page was included as part of the Advocate's annual "40 Under 40" list.

Filmography

Films

Television

Video games

Awards and nominations

See also

• List of former child actors from Canada

References

External links

• Ellen Page at DMOZ
• Ellen Page at the Internet Movie Database
• Ellen Page on Twitter