Claire Catherine Danes was born on April 12, 1979, in New York, NY. (She's an Aries). She grew up in a SoHo neighborhood in Manhattan. I heard it was on Crosby Street. Her father, Chris is a computer consultant. Her mother, Carla, is a painter and a teacher. They met in art school. Claire also has a brother, Asa, who is a college senior. When Claire was 6, she started attending dance class. When she was 9, she started going to the Lee Strasberg Theatre Institute. At the age of 11, she starred in Dreams of Love, a student film directed by Milos Foreman, as a molested child. She was also a guest star on Law & Order that year, but I'm not going to tell you what happens! In grades 6 and 7, she went to the Professional Performing Arts School in New York, which is a public school. When she was 13, she was offered a role in Shindler's List. She turned it down because she couldn't be tutored on the set in Poland. At that same age, she tried out for My So-Called Life, a television series, as main character Angela Chase. It took a while for the pilot to get aired, so, by the second episode, everyone had grown quite a bit. She attracted all sorts of fans; one being Winona Ryder. Winona thought she'd be great as Beth in her 1994 film, Little Women. So that got her career in movies going. A year later, she had an appearance in another film Winona was in - How To Make An American Quilt. One of her co-stars from MSCL, Jared Leto, also had a small role in it. Claire was also in Home For The Holidays that year. She played Jodie Foster's daughter, Kitt. The movie kind of sucked and the only highlights I found in it were the few bits that Claire was in, but if you like slow moving films, I'd recommend it. In 1996, she starred in Romeo & Juliet with Leonardo DiCaprio. She beat Alicia Silverstone for the part of Juliet, which is a good thing because that's one of my favorite roles of hers. In what year, I don't know, but when she was in the production of Kids On Stage, she choreographed a dance solo. I don't have the history of how she got her other roles, but they are listed on the main page. She is starting another year in Yale University this fall. I'm pretty sure her major is psychology. Her grandfather, Christopher, got his doctorate at Yale in 1949. He was the Dean of the School of Art and Architecture at Yale as well. Claire seems to be very proud of her paper last year on Female Masturbation for Women's Health. She mentioned it on both Leno's and Conan's shows. She described it quite graphically on Conan. Claire seems to prefer musicians when it comes to dating. When she was 16, she dated Andrew Dorff. She is currently dating Ben Lee and has been since 1997, when they got together on her birthday. It was rumored that she dated Matt Damon, but I'm not sure if it's true. First of all, he's almost a decade older than her. Also, the first time I heard of this, it was in some magazine that said that he asked her out but she turned him down. Then it went on to say that he would be making some rain of his own or something like that. Rainmaker came out in 1997, the same year the rumor came out. She was dating Ben in 97, though. And wasn't Winona going out with Matt? Sure, it was probably before Claire met Ben, but I think Claire liked Ben for a while. They sent faxes to each other and such. And Matt's not a musician. Not that it would really matter, but that's just one strike against him. I don't believe the rumor, but you make your own decision. Many people compare Claire to Jodie Foster. Claire doesn't seem to mind. Jodie is one of her idols. She's worked with her in Home For The Holidays, and she will again in Flora Plum, which Foster is directing. Why do people compare Claire to Jodie? Because she went to Lycee Francais, which is a school that Jodie also went to, and she goes to Yale, which is the university Jodie went to. She also started her career early, as Jodie did. There's probably more, but I don't remember it all.
