JOAN CUSACK (Mother) has received two Academy Award nominations, one for her comic portrayal of a Staten Island secretary in Working Girl with Harrison Ford and Melanie Griffith, the other for her role as Kevin Kline's jilted bride in the critically acclaimed In & Out. Among her other roles are the femme fatale in Addams Family Values, Grosse Point Blank, Nine Months, The Cabinet of Dr. Ramirez (directed by Peter Sellars), Corrina, Corrina, Toys, Hero, My Blue Heaven, Men Don't Leave, Broadcast News, Say Anything and Sixteen Candles, among others. She made her screen debut in Tony Bill's My Bodyguard at age 15.

Cusack recently appeared on the big screen in Richard Linklater's The School of Rock, Stephen Frears' High Fidelity, Where the Heart Is with Natalie Portman and Ashley Judd, Arlington Road with Tim Robbins and Jeff Bridges, Runaway Bride with Julia Roberts and Richard Gere, and in director Tim Robbins' Cradle Will Rock with Bill Murray. She will next be seen starring alongside Kate Hudson in Garry Marshall's Raising Helen.

Cusack's theatre work includes the premiere of Brilliant Traces at New York's Cherry Lane Theatre, The Road at La Mama and Imogen in Cymbeline at the Public Theatre in New York. She was Helena in A Midsummer Night's Dream at the Goodman Theatre in Chicago, and was directed by Joanne Akalitis in 'Tis a Pity She's a Whore.

On television, Cusack was a regular on Saturday Night Live during the show's 1985-86 season. She also appeared with Anne Bancroft in the BBC production of Paddy Chayefsky's The Mother.

Cusack studied acting at the Piven Theatre Workshop in Evanston, Illinois, where she grew up. While at the University of Wisconsin in Madison, she appeared with The Ark, an improv group. She graduated with a degree in English.