Background

Ethnicity: Lisa Kudrow's parents are both from Jewish families (from Belarus, Russia, and Hungary).

Lisa Kudrow was born on July 30, 1963, in Los Angeles, California, the United States. Her mother Nedra worked as a travel agent, while her father Dr. Lee N. Kudrow was a physician who specialized in treating headaches. She has a brother and a sister. The youngest of three children, she grew up in a middle-class Jewish family.

Education

Lisa Kudrow got her primary education from Portola Middle School in Tarzana, California. She then went to Taft High School in Woodland Hills, Los Angeles. She was good at academics and also had an interest in sports. As a teenager, Kudrow excelled at tennis and played on the varsity team at Taft High School.

She was inspired by her father and wanted to follow in his footsteps. She earned her Bachelor of Science degree in biology from Vassar College with an intention of researching the cause behind headaches, just like her father. She was even credited in his studies about headaches as one of the researchers. Kudrow started acting in the meantime, but she remained as part of the staff for eight years and let it go when her career took off.

Career

Lisa's brother's childhood friend, comedian Jon Lovitz, sensed that she had a penchant for comedy and acting, and encouraged her to perform. She tried to break into acting while continuing to work for her father as a medical researcher. Eventually, Kudrow became a member of the renowned Los Angeles improv comedy troupe The Groundlings. Lisa honed her comedic skills there and with other improv groups, including Unexpected Company, alongside Conan O'Brien, and the Transformers Comedy Group.

Kudrow's early foray into television comedies was marked by ups and downs. She unsuccessfully auditioned for Saturday Night Live in 1990 but did land the role of Ursula, the spacey waitress on the sitcom Mad About You in 1992. Soon, she got an opportunity to perform with other improv groups as well and started auditioning for television roles. She appeared as Kathy Fleisher in three episodes of season one of the popular sitcom Bob. However, after being cast that same year for the role of Roz in Frasier, she was replaced during the filming of the pilot episode by Peri Gilpin.

Kudrow's biggest break came when she was cast as Phoebe Buffay, the lovable folk-singing massage therapist, on the sitcom Friends. The show became an instant hit after premiering in 1994. She became very popular by playing this role and earned several awards and accolades for her performance. Kudrow went on to earn an Emmy Award in 1998 and a Screen Actors Guild Award in 2000 for her work on the prime-time comedy.

She also reprised her role as Ursula from Mad About You, who appeared on Friends as Phoebe's twin sister. During the ninth and 10th seasons of Friends, Kudrow, along with her female castmates and friends Courteney Cox and Jennifer Aniston, became the highest-paid TV actresses of all time, receiving $1 million per episode.

Her role in Friends made her a household name in the United States and it was not long before she started receiving offers to appear in films. Even though she had already played minor roles in some movies, she was now getting more substantial roles. Leveraging the fame from her top-rated TV show, Kudrow transitioned to the big screen in movies such as Romy and Michele's High School Reunion (1997), The Opposite of Sex (1998), and Analyze This (1999). Meanwhile, her popularity as a television star also continued to rise.

In 2002, she played the role of Laura Sobel in the mafia comedy film Analyze That, a sequel to the 1999 film Analyze This. The film also starred Robert De Niro and Billy Crystal who played the roles of mobster Paul Vitti and psychiatrist Ben Sobel respectively. In the 2007 drama film P.S. I Love You, she was cast as Denise, one of the friends of the protagonist, played by Hilary Swank. In 2009, she appeared in many movies, including Hotel for Dogs, Powder Blue, and Paper Man.

In 2005, Kudrow starred in the premiere of The Comeback, an HBO comedy she also co-created and co-wrote with Michael Patrick King, an executive producer of Sex and the City. A satirical look at the entertainment industry, The Comeback featured Kudrow as Valerie Cherish, a washed-up sitcom actress attempting to make her return to the business. The show aired for 13 episodes and was canceled, only to be revived in 2014 for a second season.

Lisa Kudrow launched Web Therapy, an improvisational web series in 2008. She starred as Fiona Wallice, a self-centered therapist who hopes to promote her new technique as a worldwide therapy option. She also served as the co-creator, writer, and executive producer of the series that ran until 2014.

Kudrow was the executive producer of the American version of the United Kingdom television series Who Do You Think You Are? where celebrities trace their familial roots. Her own heritage was also traced and it was revealed that her great-grandmother died in the Holocaust. Kudrow going in search of her roots in Eastern Europe was broadcast in 2010.

Kudrow has since appeared on the big screen in the Seth Rogen comedy Neighbors (2014), as well as on the small screen with a recurring role on the popular drama Scandal. Proving she retains the innate ability to make audiences laugh, she earned the 10th Emmy nomination of her career in 2015, for her work on The Comeback.

In 2017, she voiced Mrs. Templeton in the animated comedy film The Boss Baby. The following year, she voiced Ozma in a short film titled Lovesick Fool - Love in the Age of Like. In 2019, she played supporting roles in movies, such as Long Shot and Booksmart. She also started voicing Judy Elk in the animated comedy TV series Human Discoveries.

Achievements

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  Lisa Kudrow is best known for her portrayal of Phoebe Buffay in the sitcom series Friends. She played a weird, goofy, eccentric, and promiscuous lady in the series. Kudrow was appreciated for her role and won an Emmy Award and two Screen Actors Guild Awards for the same.
  
  In 1998, she won the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series for her role in Friends. The same year, she received the New York Film Critics Circle award for Best Supporting Actress for the film The Opposite of Sex. She won the Gracie Award for Outstanding Female Lead in a Comedy Series for The Comeback in 2006. In 2011, she was presented with the Webby Award for Best Individual Performance for the improvised online series Web Therapy.

Works

More photos

• movie

  • Easy A

    (After a little white lie about losing her virginity gets ...)

    2010
  • Kabluey

    (A hilarious and charming comedy about a slacker uncle who...)

    2007
  • Paper Man

    (Golden Globe and Tony nominee Jeff Daniels stars as Richa...)

    2009
  • Booksmart

    (In this refreshingly unfiltered comedy, two overachieving...)

    2019
  • Table 19

    (After being replaced as maid of honor, Eloise (Anna Kendr...)

    2017
  • Long Shot

    (Sparks fly after a journalist becomes a speechwriter for ...)

    2019
  • Neighbors 2: Sorority Rising

    (Mac and Kelly are forced to team up with their ex-neighbo...)

    2016
  • The Girl on the Train

    (Rachel, devastated by her recent divorce, spends her dail...)

    2016
  • The Other Woman

    (In an astonishing performance, Natalie Portman stars as a...)

    2009
  • Like a Boss

    (Best friends, Mia and Mel (Tiffany Haddish & Rose Byrne) ...)

    2020
  • The Opposite Of Sex

    (A sixteen-year-old girl runs away from her troubled Lousi...)

    1998
  • Dance with Death

    (In this dark, sensuous thriller, the sexiest strippers at...)

    1992
  • Analyze That

    (Outrageous sequel to the hit comedy "Analyze This!" Mafia...)

    2002
  • Marci X

    (A Jewish-American Princess is forced to take control of a...)

    2003
  • Analyze This

    (A frantic psychiatrist's life is turned upside down when ...)

    1999
  • Hanging Up

    (Moving comedy/drama about three sisters (Diane Keaton, Me...)

    2000
  • The Unborn

    (A young wife suspects that a mysterious doctor has insemi...)

    1991
  • Bandslam

    (Vanessa Hudgens, Aly Michalka, Gaelan Connell, and Lisa K...)

    2009
  • All Over The Guy

    (All Over The Guy is a contemporary romantic comedy about ...)

    2001
  • Happy Endings

    (Happy Endings weaves multiple stories to create a witty l...)

    2005
  • P.S. I Love You

    (A young widow discovers that her late husband has left he...)

    2007
  • Wonderland

    (In the police investigation of a brutal crime scene, one ...)

    2003
  • Powder Blue

    (On the gritty streets of LA, the destinies of four people...)

    2009
  • Mother

    (A neurotic, twice-divorced sci-fi writer moves back in wi...)

    1996
  • Bark

    (Peter (Lee Tergesen) is dumbfounded when his wife (Heathe...)

    2002
  • Romy And Michele's High School Reunion

    (Two carefree party girls try to reinvent themselves to im...)

    1997
  • Hotel for Dogs

    (An orphaned teen who secretly takes in stray dogs in an a...)

    2009
  • Lucky Numbers

    (A television weatherman scams a local lottery.)

    2000
  • Dr. Dolittle 2

    (To save a forest slated for logging, Dr. Dolittle has to ...)

    2001

• TV series

  • Mad About You

    (Mad About You explores the romantic ups and downs of an e...)

    1993
  • Web Therapy

    (Lisa Kudrow (Friends) writes and stars in this Webby Awar...)

  • Friends

    (This is a show about love and sex and careers and a time ...)

    1994

Religion

Lisa Kudrow follows Judaism and had a Bat Mitzvah ceremony.

Views

Lisa Kudrow supports over thirteen charitable causes, including Clothes Off Our Back, Dress for Success, Entertainment Industry Foundation, Family Equality Council, and Feeding America.

Quotations: "Life's a lot easier when you're dumb."

"You can't pursue something and be committed to it if you're apologizing for it at every party."

Personality

For Kudrow, the American actor, Jon Lovitz was the most influential person. He convinced her to leave her job as a medical researcher, and start an acting career. She is also a huge fan of Diane Keaton.

Interests

• Baking

• Writers

  Love Sold Separately by Ellen Meister

• Artists

  Laurie Simmons

• Sport & Clubs

  Tennis

• Music & Bands

  Taylor Swift, Selena Gomez, Ariana Grande

Connections

Lisa started dating the American TV host Conan O’Brien in 1988. They were in the relationship for 5 years, before splitting up in 1993. Kudrow was then linked with the American advertising executive Michel Stern. The couple got engaged in 1994 and got married one year after on May 27, 1995. Kudrow gave birth to her only child at age 34, a son Julian Murray Stern on May 7, 1998.

Father:

Lee N. Kudrow

Lee is a physician and a migraine specialist, who founded California Medical Clinic for Headache.

Mother:

Nedra Stern

Nedra used to be a travel agent.

Spouse:

Michel Stern

ex-boyfriend:

Conan O'Brien

colleague:

Emma Roberts

Son:

Julian Murray Stern

Friend:

Jennifer Aniston

Friend:

Courteney Cox

colleague:

Emma Stone

Friend:

Matthew Perry

References

• Lisa Kudrow on Twitter
• Lisa Kudrow on Instagram