Jennifer Tilly

Jennifer Tilly (born Jennifer Ellen Chan; September 16, 1958) is an American–Canadian actress and professional poker player.

Known for her distinctive breathy voice and comedic timing, she is the recipient of a Saturn Award, a Fantasporto Award and a GLAAD Award, as well as nominations for an American Comedy Award, a Gemini Award, two MTV Movie Awards, and one Academy Award.

Following a succession of small parts in film and on television throughout the mid-late 1980s, Tilly made her feature film breakthrough with a supporting role as Olive Neal in Bullets Over Broadway (1994), for which she was nominated for the Oscar for Best Supporting Actress.

In 1983, Tilly had small roles and had a recurring guest role on Hill Street Blues as Gina Srignoli, a mobster's widow who becomes romantically involved with detective Henry Goldblume.

She played Frasier Crane's seductive-but-ditzy date Candi Pearson on an episode of the fourth season of Cheers and appeared as a similar character on the eleventh season of Frasier.

She appeared as Garry's girlfriend on It's Garry Shandling's Show, which aired on Showtime.

She was also cast as a high-end prostitute on the short-lived comedy Key West, alongside Fisher Stevens.

Tilly's other film credits include The Fabulous Baker Boys (1989), Made in America (1993), Liar Liar (1997), Music from Another Room (1998), Stuart Little (1999), The Cat's Meow (2001), Monsters, Inc. (2001), The Haunted Mansion (2003), Home on the Range (2004), and Tideland (2005).

In 1989, she had a prominent role in the comedy Let It Ride, starring Richard Dreyfuss.

Tilly's breakthrough film role was short but memorable appearance as a waitress who fails miserably when auditioning to be a singer in The Fabulous Baker Boys, a role that was written specially for her by Steve Kloves.

She was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for her role as Olive Neal, a hopelessly bad actress in Woody Allen's Bullets Over Broadway but she lost to her co-star Dianne Wiest.

In 1994, she also had a small role in The Getaway with Alec Baldwin and Kim Basinger.

She subsequently earned acclaim for her portrayal of Violet, a bisexual femme fatale, in Bound (1996).

Tilly starred in Bound (1996), directed by The Wachowskis, which portrays a lesbian relationship her character has with Gina Gershon.

She played Samantha Cole in the Jim Carrey comedy Liar Liar (1997).

Tilly rose to widespread recognition when she played Tiffany Valentine in Bride of Chucky (1998), reprising the character in several more instalments of the Child's Play film series, as well as the Syfy/USA show Chucky (2021–present).

Her association with the franchise has established her as a pop culture icon and scream queen.

The character was first introduced in the fourth installment of the franchise, Bride of Chucky (1998), and subsequently appeared in Seed of Chucky (2004), Curse of Chucky (2013), Cult of Chucky (2017), and the television series Chucky (2021).

In Seed of Chucky, she plays a dual role, providing the voice for Tiffany and also playing an exaggerated version of herself.

The performance earned her nominations for the Fangoria Chainsaw Award for Best Actress and the MTV Movie Award for Best Scared-As-Shit Performance.

She reprises the role in every subsequent appearance.

Since 1999, Tilly has voiced Bonnie Swanson on the Fox animated sitcom Family Guy.

In Dancing at the Blue Iguana (2000), she played a stripper and part-time dominatrix.

On stage, she appeared in the Broadway revivals of The Women (2001) and Don't Dress for Dinner (2012), and was the recipient of a Theatre World Award in 1993 for her performance in the off-Broadway play One Shoe Off.

Tilly is a World Series of Poker bracelet winner, the first celebrity to win such a tournament.

She portrayed gossip columnist Louella Parsons in the Peter Bogdanovich historical drama The Cat's Meow (2001).

She gained additional popularity around that time for her portrayal of serial killer Tiffany Valentine in several of the Child's Play horror movie series.

She won the third World Poker Tour Ladies Invitational Tournament in 2005, and was nominated for PokerListings' Spirit of Poker Living Legend Award in 2014.

As of 2019, her live tournament winnings exceeded $1 million.

Tilly was born Jennifer Ellen Chan in Harbor City, Los Angeles.

She is the first daughter of Harry Chan, a used car salesman, and Patricia (née Tilly), a Canadian schoolteacher and former stage actress.

Her father was of Chinese descent and her mother was of Irish and Finnish ancestry.

She has an older brother, Steve, and two younger sisters, Meg and Rebecca.

Following her parents' divorce when she was five, Tilly was raised by her mother and stepfather, John Ward, on rural Texada Island in British Columbia.

According to her sister Meg, Ward was a sadistic pedophile.

Their sister Rebecca agreed, but Jennifer did not comment on the issue.

Her mother divorced again when Tilly was 16.

The family then moved to Langford, a suburb of Victoria, British Columbia, where Tilly attended Belmont Secondary School.

During her high school years, she developed an interest in theater, which prompted her to actively participate in plays as an extra with the assistance of her mother.

Tilly holds a bachelor's degree in theater from Stephens College in Missouri.