Career
Her acting career began early with a part in the series Bellbird in 1967. However, it was straight from graduating at National Institute of Dramatic Arts (NIDA) that she got her big break with the part of Esther Wolcott in the ABC series Seven Little Australians. Allegedly the producers had all but given up on the show, because they did not feel that they had found a suitable actress for the part, until they discovered Elizabeth Alexander. She was actually younger than actress Barbara Llewellyn, who played her stepdaughter Meg in the series, but producers felt that they were both convincing in their roles.
The ten-part series delivered huge ratings when it was broadcast in 1973, and was also the first ABC series to enjoy international acclaim. It went on to win three AFI Awards and four Penguins, including best drama series and a Logie Award for Best New Talent for Elizabeth Alexander as the sweet-tempered Esther. The series is now available on DVD.
She had a recurring guest role in the high rating Australian medical drama All Saints as the viper-like Dr. Alison Newell, ex-wife of Dr. Frank Campion, played by John Howard. She was not initially written as his ex-wife, as her character appeared before Howard joined the cast. Apparently, it was the sharp onscreen dynamic between Alexander and Howard in their early scenes together that made the writers decide to write this history into Alexander’s character.
Other television credits include: Home and Away (She played Christine Jones, the overprotective conservative mother of Melody Jones), Silent Number, Special Squad, Chopper Squad, Farscape, Murder Call, Seven Deadly Sins (Pride), Salem's Lot and Time Trax, a science fiction series in which she starred as a computer hologram alongside Dale Midkiff.
Her film work includes: the lead role in The Killing of Angel Street (which won an award at the Berlin Film Festival) opposite John Hargreaves, The Chant of Jimmie Blacksmith, Summerfield with Nick Tate and John Waters, Sebastian and the Sparrow and The Journalist with Sam Neill. 2010 saw her appear in a thriller called The Clinic and in 2011 she will make an appearance in Fred Schepisi's "In the Eye of the Storm".
Her theatre credits are also numerous and include: Hermione in The Winter's Tale, Portia in The Merchant of Venice for which she received glowing reviews, Martha in the Sydney Theatre Company’s production of Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? for which she again received extremely positive reviews, Kate in another STC production of Harold Pinter’s Old Times and many more. She also played Margaret Mead in David Williamson’s play Heretic. The play, based on the life and work of anthropologist Margaret Mead, was the subject of much debate and controversy due to the very public row between the writer, Williamson, and the director Wayne Harrison over the play’s production.
She has also directed a number of plays and written several screenplays, including a short film titled Memento (which was sold to Village Roadshow) which she also directed, about the emotional problems caused by the return of a father to his family, a young boy and his mother. She also directed a feature film, A Spy in the Family. Alongside this she also does voiceover work.
Read more about this topic: Elizabeth Alexander (actress)
Famous quotes containing the word career:
“Like the old soldier of the ballad, I now close my military career and just fade away, an old soldier who tried to do his duty as God gave him the light to see that duty. Goodbye.”
—Douglas MacArthur (1880–1964)
“The 19-year-old Diana ... decided to make her career that of wife. Today that can be a very, very iffy line of work.... And what sometimes happens to the women who pursue it is the best argument imaginable for teaching girls that they should always be able to take care of themselves.”
—Anna Quindlen (b. 1952)
“It is a great many years since at the outset of my career I had to think seriously what life had to offer that was worth having. I came to the conclusion that the chief good for me was freedom to learn, think, and say what I pleased, when I pleased. I have acted on that conviction... and though strongly, and perhaps wisely, warned that I should probably come to grief, I am entirely satisfied with the results of the line of action I have adopted.”
—Thomas Henry Huxley (1825–95)