Emmy Rossum

• 1. Introduction

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  Emmanuelle Grey Rossum was seven years old when she sang "Happy Birthday" in all 12 keys for a stranger. The stranger was Elena Doria, director of the Metropolitan Opera Children's Chorus, and the performance earned the girl a place in the chorus.

  Rossum, born on the 12th of September 1986 in New York City, is an American actress and singer-songwriter. Her honors include a Saturn Award and a Critics' Choice Award. She has also been nominated for a Golden Globe Award and an Independent Spirit Award.

  A list of trophies explains little about how a child chorister ended up on film sets, then on a long-running cable drama, then behind the camera. How did that voice find its way into movies? Why did she turn away from the music that first made her name? And what made her leave a role she had held for years?

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• 2. Stage Before Screen

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  For five years, Rossum sang onstage with the Metropolitan Opera Children's Chorus. Her fellow performers included Plácido Domingo and Luciano Pavarotti. The pay was modest, anywhere from $5 to $10 a night.

  Across those years she sang in six languages in 20 operas. The list includes La bohème, Turandot, and A Midsummer Night's Dream. It also includes a Carnegie Hall presentation of La damnation de Faust. In Carmen, she worked under the direction of Franco Zeffirelli.

  Her mother, Cheryl Rossum, raised her alone and worked as a corporate photographer. Her parents separated while her mother was pregnant, and as of 2007 Rossum had met her father only twice. She is an only child, and her first name honors her maternal great-grandfather Emanuel, in a feminine spelling.

  A growing wish to act led her to classes with Flo Salant Greenberg of The New Actors Workshop in New York City. She has also worked with the acting coach Terry Knickerbocker.

  School was fitted around the career. Rossum attended the Spence School, a private school in Manhattan, but left to pursue work. At 15 she earned her high school diploma through online-extension courses from Stanford University's Education Program for Gifted Youth. She then enrolled at Columbia University to study French, art history and philosophy. By then she had been appearing on television for years.

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• 3. Child Actress

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  In August 1997, Rossum made her television debut as the original Abigail Williams on the daytime soap opera As the World Turns. She also played Caroline Beels in a guest role on Snoops. Her work in the Disney Channel Original Movie Genius earned a Young Artist Award nomination in 1999. In 2000 she played a young Audrey Hepburn in the ABC television film The Audrey Hepburn Story.

  Her film debut came at 13, in 2000's Songcatcher. She played Deladis Slocumb, an Appalachian orphan. The film premiered at the Sundance Film Festival and won the Special Jury Award for Outstanding Ensemble Performance. Rossum was nominated for an Independent Spirit Award for Best Debut Performance.

  Songcatcher also let her sing a duet with Dolly Parton on its soundtrack. Variety magazine named her "One of the Ten to Watch" in 2000. In 2003 she would play the title role of an aspiring songwriter in Nola.

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• 4. The Breakthrough Years

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  Clint Eastwood's Mystic River, released in 2003, was Rossum's first major studio film. She played Katie Markum, the ill-fated daughter of the small-business owner Jimmy Markum, who was played by Sean Penn.

  In 2004 she played Laura Chapman in the sci-fi disaster film The Day After Tomorrow. That same year she won the lead of Christine Daaé in The Phantom of the Opera, the film version of Andrew Lloyd Webber's musical. She was the last actress to audition, and she arrived in full costume and make-up. Her family had nearly caused her to miss the audition entirely. Lloyd Webber then asked her to audition in person at his home in New York.

  The performance brought a Golden Globe Award nomination for Best Actress in a musical or comedy. It also brought a Critics' Choice Award for Best Young Actress and a Saturn Award for Best Performance by a Younger Actor. The National Board of Review honored her with its award for Best Breakthrough Performance by an Actress. Her singing is on the film's soundtrack, including "Think of Me" with Patrick Wilson.

  In 2006, Rossum played Jennifer Ramsey in Poseidon, Wolfgang Petersen's remake of The Poseidon Adventure. Ramsey is the daughter of Kurt Russell's character. Rossum described her as proactive and strong in every situation, not a damsel in distress. That same year she played Juliet Capulet in Romeo and Juliet at the Williamstown Theatre Festival.

  Early 2009 brought Dragonball Evolution, which was poorly received. Her next film, the indie Dare, was an official selection of the 2009 Sundance Film Festival. In November 2009, she joined Broadway's 24 Hour Plays, in which six one-act plays are produced and performed within a single day. The event benefited the Urban Arts Partnership, and she appeared in Warren Leight's "Daily Bread," directed by Lucie Tiberghien. A month later, a Showtime series would change her career.

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• 5. Fiona Gallagher

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  In December 2009, Rossum joined the cast of Shameless, a Showtime dramedy based on a British series of the same title. William H. Macy co-stars. She plays Fiona Gallagher, the oldest sister in a large, motherless family, who acts as guardian and surrogate mother to her five younger siblings. The series drew steady acclaim, and her performance won praise across the board.

  Shameless also gave her a first chance to direct. Her debut was episode four of season seven, titled "I Am a Storm." She later directed for other series as well. These include the Animal Kingdom episode "Broken Boards" in 2017 and a Modern Love episode in 2019.

  In December 2016, a contract dispute broke out with the show's producers. Rossum wanted a salary equal to Macy's, plus back pay for the difference over seven seasons. The dispute was resolved later that month. Shameless was then renewed for an eighth season, with production beginning in 2017.

  In August 2018, Rossum announced that she was leaving the series after nine seasons.

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• 6. Finding Her Own Sound

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  After The Phantom of the Opera, record labels offered Rossum several deals to make classical albums. She refused. She felt frustrated by what she saw as a lack of "emotional honesty" in the music on the radio, and chose contemporary music instead.

  She described her aim in her own words: "It's pop music, but not Britney Spears bubblegum pop. I want it to have a David Gray or Annie Lennox feel. I've been spending up to 12 hours a day in the studio." She names Sarah McLachlan, Whitney Houston, Celine Dion and Faith Hill among her influences.

  Her debut album, Inside Out, was produced by Stuart Brawley. She wrote the songs herself. It was released on the 23rd of October 2007 and peaked at 199 on the U.S. Billboard chart. Earlier that year, the song "Slow Me Down" appeared on a compilation called Girl Next, released on the 10th of July 2007. Yahoo chose her as its "Who's Next" artist of the month, and MSN called her a "One to Watch." A Christmas EP, Carol of the Bells, followed late in 2007.

  The live dates that year were varied. She sang the national anthem at a NASCAR race at Infineon Raceway. On the 27th of October 2007 she sang it again at the New Jersey Devils' first home game of the 2007-08 season, the first game in the new Prudential Center. She performed at the first Perez Hilton Presents event at the El Rey Theatre in Hollywood. She also sang at the Hollywood Christmas Celebration at the Grove in Los Angeles and at the Lighting of the Great Tree in Atlanta, Georgia.

  In early 2009, Rossum joined Counting Crows, Augustana, and Michael Franti & Spearhead as a special guest on select dates of the Traveling Circus and Medicine Show tour. In 2010 she sang on "Cruel One," a track from Alex Band's solo debut We've All Been There, alongside Chantal Kreviazuk.

  On the 29th of January 2013 she released Sentimental Journey on Warner Bros. Records. This one was a collection of covers of songs from the 1920s to the 1960s. It peaked at 92 on the Billboard chart and reached number one on the Jazz Albums chart.

  Rossum calls herself a lyric soprano and says her voice is still developing. She continues to train at ZajacStudio, run by the soprano Joann C. Zajac.

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• 7. Life After Fiona

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  In mid-2011, Rossum starred in D. J. Caruso's Inside, an online film released in several segments. It was spread across Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter. In Beautiful Creatures, released in 2013, she played Ridley, a siren Caster. Reviews of the film were mixed, though critics and fans praised her performance.

  In You're Not You she played Bec, an inexperienced caregiver who befriends Kate, a woman living with the degenerative disease ALS. Hilary Swank played Kate. By June 2013, Rossum was cast as the female lead opposite Justin Long in the independent romantic comedy Comet. The film was directed by Sam Esmail, whom she later became engaged to. She also appeared in Before I Disappear in 2014, based on the Academy Award-winning short film Curfew.

  In 2019, she appeared as Kim Dash in Cold Pursuit. That same year it was announced that she would star in Angelyne for Peacock, the new streaming service from NBC. Her husband and longtime collaborator Sam Esmail co-produced it. The limited series is based on an investigative feature by Gary Baum, a senior writer at The Hollywood Reporter, about the Los Angeles billboard model Angelyne. It was her first lead role after Shameless, and she also served as an executive producer.

  In 2023, she played Candy Sullivan in the miniseries The Crowded Room. In 2024, she starred opposite Zoë Winters in an Off-Broadway staging of Amy Berryman's play Walden, directed by Whitney White. It was the last production by Second Stage Theater in the Tony Kiser Theater.

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• 8. Off Camera

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  Rossum was a YouthAIDS ambassador. In 2008 she became the spokesperson for Pinkitude, an apparel line inspired by the Pink Panther character, to raise awareness of breast cancer. In 2010 she appeared in public service announcements for the Natural Resources Defense Council Action Fund. She also works with Global Green USA on environmental protection. In 2015 she campaigned with the Best Friends Animal Society to encourage animal adoption.

  On the 26th of May 2009, she attended a march in West Hollywood protesting the California Supreme Court ruling that upheld Proposition 8. In February 2024, she was one of 400 celebrities who signed an open letter from Creative Community for Peace. It denounced attempts to remove Israel from Eurovision 2024 amid the Gaza war.

  Her mother is of Russian Jewish descent, and her father is a Protestant of English and Dutch ancestry. Rossum identifies as Jewish and says her mother instilled in her the "Jewish code of ethics and morals." She has also called herself "a spiritual person, but not especially religious."

  She lives with celiac disease and predominantly hyperactive ADHD. She has taken medication for the ADHD since childhood. Through her cousin, the investor and real-estate developer Arthur P. Becker, she has a link to fashion. Becker was married to the designer Vera Wang from 1989 to 2012.

  Rossum married Justin Siegel in February 2008, although the two presented themselves publicly as an unmarried couple. In September 2009-19 months later, he filed for divorce, citing irreconcilable differences. It was finalized on the 28th of December 2010. From 2009 to 2010 she dated the musician Adam Duritz.

  In 2013, she began dating the writer and director Sam Esmail, and they became engaged in August 2015. They married on the 29th of May 2017 at the Central Synagogue in New York City. Their daughter was born in May 2021, and their son in April 2023.

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