"Conversations" previously featured the writer and leading actress of the run away independent box office hit, "My Big Fat Greek Wedding" Nia Vardalos in 2002.
Nia Vardalos is an actress who is living the Hollywood dream. After performing in comedy theaters all over the world, guest starring in numerous television series and appearing in several films, she created a vehicle for herself that would provide the kind of role in which she could flourish as an actress. Her one-woman show, "My Big Fat Greek Wedding," which became the first show in the history of the "Just For Laughs" Festival in Montreal to sell out before the run began, was discovered by Rita Wilson and Tom Hanks a few years ago. When they expressed interested in turning this show into a film, Vardalos handed them the first screenplay that she had ever written and they agreed to let her to play the lead role.
Vardalos wrote "My Big Fat Greek Wedding" based on the warmth and humor of her ethnic upbringing. It is a hilarious true story about love and nuptials when two worlds collide. The film was the first feature film for Playtone whose partners include Hanks and Gary Goetzman and it became the boxoffice sleeper hit of the year. The film, which was produced with a budget under $5 million, grossed $241,438,208 making it the highest grossing independent film in history.
In the play, on which the film is based, Vardalos played ten characters based on her family. It ran in Toronto and Los Angeles where it was nominated for an Ovation Award as Best New Play. Vardalos wrote the screenplay when several companies expressed interest in it. She would make it clear that she would not sell the screenplay unless they let her star as the lead. Wilson and Hanks saw her show and immediately bought the screenplay. They did not waiver in their support of Vardalos as the only woman who could play the bride in this film.
She was a performer and writer of 12 revues and won Chicago's Jeff Award for Best Actress. She took a job in the box office of The Second City in order to be able to watch the show every night. Two weeks later an actress fell ill and had to cancel fifteen minutes before showtime. Vardalos convinced them that she could fill the role and they let her. She was hired the next day. She went on to guest star on several television shows including "The Drew Carey Show" and "Two Guys and a Girl" and had roles in several films.
Vardalos is a native of Winnipeg and now lives in Los Angeles with her husband.
Born and raised in New York City, David Duchovny (Jeff) attended Princeton University (where he played one season as shooting guard on the school's basketball team), received his masters' degree in English literature from Yale, and was on the road to earning his PhD when he caught the acting bug.
Subsequently, Duchovny emerged to become one of the most highly acclaimed actors in Hollywood. The star of Fox Television's monster hit The X Files, he was nominated for an Emmy for Outstanding Actor in a Drama Series; he was also nominated for Outstanding Guest Actor in a Comedy Series for his highly acclaimed (and some say) risqué appearances on The Larry Sanders Show. In January 1997, Duchovny won a Golden Globe Award for Best Actor in a Drama Series.
He has been nominated for a total of three Golden Globes, three Screen Actors Guild and a TV Critics Award for Best Actor in a Drama Series. The press and the public both agree that Duchovny brings a fierce intellect, a quiet intensity and an acerbic wit to his roles on both the small and the silver screen.
Since The X Files debuted, millions and millions of self-proclaimed "X-Philes" spent their Sunday nights wide-eyed in anticipation as their hero, the brilliant and sullen FBI Agent Fox Mulder (Duchovny), explored cases deemed unbelievable or unsolvable by the Bureau. Duchovny's remarkable performance on The X Files earned him the title of "Zeitgeist Icon" by Laura Jacobs in The New Republic and "the first Internet sex symbol with hair" by Maureen Dowd in The New York Times.
Duchovny added the role of director to his already extensive list of accomplishments when he wrote, directed and starred in two critically acclaimed episodes of The X Files: "The Unnatural," which starred Jessie Martin; and "Hollywood A.D.," starring Garry Shandling and actress Téa Leoni. Duchovny's passion for renegade films has brought him critical acclaim for his performances in the feature films Kalifornia, in which he co-starred with Brad Pitt and Juliette Lewis; The Rapture, the controversial film directed by Michael Tolkin in which Duchovny starred opposite Mimi Rogers; and Julia Has Two Lovers, in which he turned in a much heralded performance as a telephone hustler. Duchovny played Roland "Rollie" Totheroh, Charlie Chaplin's longtime confidante and cameraman, in the Sir Richard Attenborough-directed Chaplin, which starred Robert Downey, Jr., in the title role; and starred in the smash hit Beethoven, opposite Charles Grodin, as the evil yuppie determined to take over Grodin's company.
His recent feature credits include the action comedy Evolution, opposite Julianne Moore, directed by Ivan Reitman (Ghostbusters); the romantic comedy Return to Me, opposite Minnie Driver, directed by Bonnie Hunt; The X Files movie, directed by Rob Bowman; the action thriller Playing God, with Timothy Hutton and Angelina Jolie, directed by Andy Wilson (winner of a Cable Ace Award for Cracker). Recently, Duchovny appeared in Ben Stiller's film Zoolander (a hilariously funny unbilled cameo performance).
Still recognized for his role as Dennis/Denise Bryson, the transvestite detective in David Lynch's breakthrough television series Twin Peaks, Duchovny has also spent four seasons as the impassioned narrator of Zalman King's erotic anthology series Red Shoe Diaries, which began as a feature-length telefilm for Showtime.
He was last seen on the big screen in 2002's Miramax ensemble comedy Full Frontal for director Steven Soderbergh, co-starring Julia Roberts, George Clooney and David Hyde Pierce. David has made brief returns to television, first appearing in good friend Bonnie Hunt's show, Life with Bonnie, in which he guest-starred as over-the-top weatherman Johnny Volcano, for which he was nominated for an Emmy in 2003.
Following that, he made a memorable appearance on Sex and the City as an ex-flame of Sarah Jessica Parker's Carrie Bradshaw.
Duchovny has recently completed filming his feature film directorial/writing debut, a coming-of-age story set in New York during the 1970s, entitled Women's House of D. In addition to writing and directing, Duchovny stars opposite Robin Williams, Téa Leoni and Erykah Bad.
David is married to actress Téa Leoni and the two have a daughter and son.
