Jennifer Lawrence

• 1. Introduction

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  Jennifer Lawrence was 14 years old and on a family vacation in New York City when a talent scout spotted her on the street. The scout arranged for her to audition for talent agents, and that detour set the course of her life. Today she is an American actress and producer whose films have grossed over $6 billion worldwide. This documentary asks how a teenager found by chance came to anchor both blockbuster franchises and small independent dramas. It asks what her hardest roles demanded of her body. And it asks what she chose to do with the influence that followed.

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• 2. Kentucky Childhood

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  Jennifer Shrader Lawrence was born on the 15th of August 1990, in Louisville, Kentucky. Her father, Gary, owns a construction company, and her mother, Karen, manages a summer camp. She has two older brothers, Ben and Blaine. Her arrival was a surprise. Karen once said, "We thought we were finished having kids. We got rid of the baby bed and everything."

  A horse named Muffin belonged to young Lawrence, whose family owned a horse farm. Her mother wanted her raised to be "tough" like her brothers, and certainly not "a diva." In preschool, Karen would not let her play with other girls, judging her "too rough" and fearing she would hurt them. Lawrence admits she was a "hyper" child. She loved horseback riding, though a fall from a horse left her with an injured tailbone.

  At Kammerer Middle School in Louisville, Lawrence considered herself a misfit. She did not enjoy her childhood, which she attributes to hyperactivity and social anxiety. "I didn't have any friends. I remember being kind of lonely," she recalled. Her anxieties vanished on stage, she has said, and acting gave her a sense of accomplishment. Sports offered no such relief. She tried cheerleading, softball, field hockey, and basketball on a boys' team coached by her father. Looking back in 2015, she said, "I hated team sports."

  When her father worked from home, she put on shows for him, often dressed as a clown or a ballerina. At age nine she landed her first acting assignment, playing a Ninevite prostitute in a church play based on the Book of Jonah. Church plays and school musicals filled the next few years.

  After her first cold reading in New York, the agents told her it was the best they had heard from someone so young. Her mother, who was not keen on an acting career, convinced her that the agents were lying. Even so, Karen briefly moved the family to New York so her daughter could read for roles. Lawrence found those early experiences lonely.

  CESD Talent Agency signed her and then persuaded her parents to let her audition in Los Angeles. Her mother encouraged modeling, but Lawrence called acting a "natural fit" for her abilities and turned down several offers. She did model for Abercrombie & Fitch before her acting career began, but those photos were never released.

  At 14, she left school without a General Educational Development certificate or a diploma. She calls herself "self-educated" and says her career was her priority. Between acting jobs in the city, she made regular visits to Louisville, where she worked as an assistant nurse at her mother's camp.

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• 3. Early Screen Work

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  Company Town, a 2006 television pilot that was never sold, gave Lawrence her first minor role. Guest parts followed on Monk in 2006 and Medium in 2007.

  The TBS sitcom The Bill Engvall Show, which premiered in 2007 and ran for three seasons, made her a series regular for the first time. She played Lauren, a rebellious teenage daughter in a family living in suburban Louisville, Colorado. Tom Shales of The Washington Post considered her a scene stealer. In 2009 she won a Young Artist Award for Outstanding Young Performer in a TV Series.

  Her film debut came in 2008 with the drama Garden Party, where she played a troubled teenager named Tiff. That year she also appeared in The Burning Plain, the first feature directed by Guillermo Arriaga. She played the teenage daughter of Kim Basinger's character, who discovers her mother's affair, and she shared the part with Charlize Theron, who played the older version. Mark Feeney of The Boston Globe called the role "a thankless task," but Derek Elley of Variety praised her as the production's prime asset. The performance won her the Marcello Mastroianni Award for Best Emerging Actress at the 2008 Venice Film Festival.

  Lori Petty's The Poker House, also from 2008, cast her as the oldest of three sisters living with a drug-abusing mother. Stephen Farber of The Hollywood Reporter said she has "a touching poise on camera that conveys the resilience of children." The role earned her an Outstanding Performance Award at the Los Angeles Film Festival.

  Debra Granik's independent drama Winter's Bone, released in 2010, brought her breakthrough. It is based on Daniel Woodrell's novel of the same name. Lawrence played 17-year-old Ree Dolly, a poverty-stricken girl in the Ozark Mountains who cares for her mentally ill mother and younger siblings while searching for her missing father. A week before filming began, she traveled to the Ozarks to live with the family on whom the story was based. She learned to fight, skin squirrels, and chop wood.

  Peter Travers of Rolling Stone wrote, "her performance is more than acting; it's a gathering storm." David Denby of The New Yorker asserted that the film "would be unimaginable with anyone less charismatic." Winter's Bone won the Grand Jury Prize at the Sundance Film Festival. Lawrence received the National Board of Review Award for Breakthrough Performance. She also earned her first nominations for the Golden Globe, the SAG Award, and the Academy Award for Best Actress, becoming the second-youngest Best Actress nominee at that time.

  Two 2011 films followed. Like Crazy, a romantic drama about long-distance relationships starring Anton Yelchin and Felicity Jones, gave her a supporting role. The Beaver, directed by Jodie Foster and starring Foster and Mel Gibson, reunited her with Yelchin. Filmed in 2009, it was delayed by controversy surrounding Gibson and earned less than half of its $21 million budget.

  After such a heavy part as Ree Dolly, Lawrence went looking for something less serious. She found it in a superhero film directed by Matthew Vaughn.

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• 4. Two Franchises

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  Eight hours in a makeup chair were required to turn Lawrence into Mystique, the blue shapeshifting mutant of X-Men: First Class, released in 2011. Latex pieces and body paint were applied to her otherwise nude body, just as they had been for Rebecca Romijn in the earlier films. That meant reporting to set at 2 a.m. Matthew Vaughn cast her because he thought she could show the weakness and strength inside the character's transformation. She lost weight and practiced yoga, and she was intimidated because she admired Romijn. Claudia Puig of USA Today called the film a "classy re-boot." With $350 million in worldwide earnings, it became her highest-grossing film up to that point.

  X-Men: Days of Future Past, released in 2014, brought her back as Mystique and grossed $748.1 million worldwide. That made it the highest-grossing film in the series at the time. Justin Chang of Variety praised her look but thought she had little to do except "glower, snarl and let the f/x artists do their thing." X-Men: Apocalypse followed in 2016 to mixed reviews, and Helen O'Hara of Empire criticized Lawrence for making her character too grim. Dark Phoenix, in 2019, was her fourth and final appearance as Mystique. It was a critical and box-office failure.

  In 2012, Lawrence starred as Katniss Everdeen in The Hunger Games, adapted from the first book in Suzanne Collins's trilogy. The story follows a teenage heroine who joins rebel forces against a totalitarian government after winning a brutal televised annual event in a post-apocalyptic future. Lawrence admired the books but hesitated because of the film's grand scale. Her mother convinced her to take the part. She trained in archery, rock and tree climbing, and hand-to-hand combat, and she injured herself running into a wall.

  Roger Ebert found her "strong and convincing in the central role." Todd McCarthy of The Hollywood Reporter called her an "ideal screen actress" who "anchors the film with impressive gravity and presence." With worldwide revenues of over $690 million, the film became a top-grossing picture with a female lead. That made Lawrence the highest-grossing action heroine of all time, a distinction Guinness World Records recognized in 2015.

  The sequel, The Hunger Games: Catching Fire, brought an injury of its own. During underwater stunts, Lawrence developed an ear infection that caused a brief loss of hearing. Stephanie Zacharek of The Village Voice wrote that "there's no sanctimony or pretense of false modesty in the way Lawrence plays her." With $865 million in box office earnings, Catching Fire remains her highest-grossing film.

  For the soundtrack of Mockingjay Part 1, Lawrence recorded the song "The Hanging Tree," which charted on multiple international singles charts. While she filmed a tunnel scene for Part 2, a malfunctioning fog machine released far too much fog and nearly suffocated her. A rescue crew carried her out. Both final installments grossed over $650 million worldwide. Manohla Dargis of The New York Times wrote that Lawrence inhabited the role "as effortlessly as breathing," partly because she seemed to be playing a version of her "real" self.

  The character is not finished with her. The Hunger Games: Sunrise on the Reaping, with Lawrence reprising Katniss, is set for release in November 2026.

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• 5. The Russell Collaborations

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  A Skype audition changed David O. Russell's mind about Lawrence. He had initially found her too young to play Tiffany Maxwell, a troubled young widow in Silver Linings Playbook, released in 2012. The film adapts Matthew Quick's novel and follows her character as she finds companionship with Pat Solitano Jr., a man with bipolar disorder, played by Bradley Cooper. Lawrence was drawn to the role's complexity. She explained, "She was just kind of this mysterious enigma to me because she didn't really fit any basic kind of character profile." Russell's spontaneity as a director challenged her, yet she described the project as the best experience of her life.

  Richard Corliss of Time magazine wrote, "Just 21 when the movie was shot, Lawrence is that rare young actress who plays, who is, grown-up." Peter Travers called her "some kind of miracle." She won the Golden Globe, the SAG Award, and the Academy Award for Best Actress. At age 22, she became the second-youngest winner in that category. Her final film of that year was House at the End of the Street, a thriller directed by Mark Tonderai with Max Thieriot and Elisabeth Shue, which critics panned.

  In American Hustle, released in 2013, Lawrence played Rosalyn Rosenfeld, the neurotic wife of con man Irving Rosenfeld, played by Christian Bale. The black comedy was inspired by the FBI's Abscam sting operation and set against political corruption in 1970s New Jersey. She did little research and drew on what she knew of the era from films and television. Geoffrey Macnab of The Independent found her "brilliant" and highlighted an improvised scene in which she aggressively kisses her husband's mistress, played by Amy Adams. She won the Golden Globe and the BAFTA Award for Best Supporting Actress. She also received her third SAG Award and Academy Award nominations, her first Oscar nomination in the supporting category. That made her the youngest actor to accrue three Oscar nominations.

  During the Boston shoot of Joy in 2015, the press reported a "screaming match" between Lawrence and Russell. She said their friendship made disagreement easier, because people fight when they really love each other. In the film she played Joy Mangano, a troubled single mother who becomes a successful businesswoman after inventing the Miracle Mop. The picture was not as well received as their earlier work, but her performance was unanimously praised. Richard Roeper called it "a wonderfully layered performance that carries the film through its rough spots and sometime dubious detours." She won her third Golden Globe and earned a fourth Oscar nomination, making her the youngest actor in history with four. It was the third film she made with Russell.

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• 6. Setbacks and Second Act

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  Serena, filmed in 2012 and released in 2014 to poor reviews, paired Lawrence with Bradley Cooper in a depression-era drama directed by Susanne Bier. It is based on Ron Rash's novel of the same name. Her character and husband turn to criminal activities after learning they cannot have children.

  A reported $20 million fee brought Lawrence to Passengers in 2016, and she received top billing over co-star Chris Pratt. The science fiction romance follows two people who wake ninety years too soon from induced hibernation on a spaceship bound for a new planet. She felt nervous about her first sex scene and about kissing a married man onscreen, and she drank alcohol to prepare. Reviews were underwhelming, to the surprise of the cast and crew. Lawrence first defended the film as a "tainted, complicated love story" but later expressed regret over starring in it.

  Darren Aronofsky's psychological horror film Mother! was her only release of 2017. She played a young wife whose home is invaded by unexpected guests. Lawrence spent three months rehearsing in a warehouse in Brooklyn, despite her reluctance to rehearse on earlier projects. The role was grueling. One day she hyperventilated and was put on supplemental oxygen, and she also dislocated a rib. The film polarized audiences and prompted mass walkouts. Walter Addiego of the San Francisco Chronicle called it a "deliberate test of audience endurance" and credited her for "never allowing herself to be reduced simply to a howling victim."

  In Red Sparrow, directed by Francis Lawrence in 2018, she played Dominika Egorova, a Russian spy who makes contact with a mysterious CIA agent played by Joel Edgerton. The film is based on Jason Matthews's novel. She learned a Russian accent and trained in ballet for four months. Eric Kohn of IndieWire disliked the ending but praised the performances of Lawrence and Charlotte Rampling.

  After several films with mixed reviews, Lawrence took a break from acting. She felt unsatisfied with her work, wanted to avoid media scrutiny, and focused on domestic activities. She had wanted to work with director Adam McKay since she was 19, and in 2021 she returned for his Netflix film Don't Look Up, for a reported fee of $25 million. She and Leonardo DiCaprio played two astronomers trying to warn humanity about an extinction-level asteroid. For the part she received a red dye job and an undercut, and she told Vogue she had researched the typical look of aspiring astrophysicists. Reviews were mixed, but critics mostly praised the two leads, and she earned her fifth Golden Globe nomination. The film set a Netflix record of 152 million hours viewed in a single week and ranks as the platform's second most-watched film within 28 days of release.

  Excellent Cadaver, the production company Lawrence formed in 2018, backed Causeway in 2022. Lila Neugebauer directed the independent drama, and Lawrence played a soldier suffering from a brain injury. After several big-budget films, she was drawn to the "slow melody of a character-driven story." Allison Wilmore of Vulture called it a welcome reminder of how compelling Lawrence can be. Under the same banner she produced Bread and Roses in 2023, a documentary from director Sahra Mani about Afghan women under Taliban rule. That year she also starred in and produced No Hard Feelings, a sex comedy from her friend Gene Stupnitsky. She played a young woman facing bankruptcy who accepts a Craigslist posting from wealthy parents to date their introverted 19-year-old son, played by Andrew Barth Feldman. Reviewers appreciated her comic timing, and she earned another Golden Globe nomination.

  Zurawski v Texas, a 2024 documentary, had Lawrence as an executive producer. Die My Love, in 2025, was a thriller directed by Lynne Ramsay that Lawrence produced and starred in. It premiered at the Cannes Film Festival. Tim Grierson of Screen International called her "the match that lights Lynne Ramsay's gripping, slow-burn fifth feature" and praised "a volcanic performance that is nonetheless very controlled, avoiding melodramatic theatrics." Some critics called it a return to form. The San Sebastian International Film Festival also gave her its Donostia Award that year, and she became the youngest recipient in its history.

  More projects are lined up. Paolo Sorrentino's adaptation of Teresa Carpenter's book Mob Girl will have her play the mafia informant Arlyne Brickman, and an untitled biopic casts her as Hollywood talent agent Sue Mengers. She will star in and produce Luca Guadagnino's adaptation of the novel Burial Rites, about the last woman executed for murder in Iceland. She is also attached to The Wives, a mystery film from Apple Studios and A24.

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• 7. Reputation and Earnings

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  In 2012, the review website IndieWire described Lawrence's off-screen persona as "down-to-earth, self-deprecating, unaffected." Adam McKay, who directed her in Don't Look Up, called her "a strong, funny truth-teller." He added, "No one has more beautiful anger than Jen. When she unleashes, it is a sight to behold." An IGN writer found her "sharp," "funny," and "quirky." Lawrence herself says she finds acting "stupid" compared with life-saving professions like medicine, so she does not believe in being "cocky" about her accomplishments.

  Rolling Stone called her "the most talented young actress in America" in 2012. Her Hunger Games co-star Donald Sutherland found her "exquisite and brilliant" and compared her craft favorably with that of Laurence Olivier. David O. Russell said her acting "is effortless and she makes it look easy." Yet she has never studied acting and has not worked in professional theater. Instead she builds her approach from watching the people around her.

  Speaking in 2010, Lawrence said she did not "invest any of my real emotions" in her characters or carry their pain home. "I don't even take it to craft services," she added. She relies on imagination, saying, "I can't go around looking for roles that are exactly like my life." She also drew a line: "If it ever came down to the point where, to make a part better, I had to lose a little bit of my sanity, I wouldn't do it. I would just do comedies."

  The Daily Telegraph reported in 2014 that she was earning $10 million per film. In 2013, Time magazine named her one of the 100 most influential people in the world. Elle labeled her the most powerful woman in the entertainment business, and Forbes ranked her the second most powerful actress, behind only Angelina Jolie. In 2014, Forbes listed her as the second-highest-paid actress in the world, with earnings of $34 million. It also named her the most powerful actress and placed her at number 12 on its Celebrity 100 list.

  Forbes ranked her the world's highest-paid actress in both 2015 and 2016, with annual earnings of $52 million and $46 million. Over the following two years she ranked third and then fourth, with $24 million and $18 million. Entertainment Weekly named her Entertainer of the Year in 2015, a title she had also won in 2012. The Hollywood Reporter listed her among the 100 most powerful people in entertainment from 2016 to 2018.

  Her image reached well beyond film. FHM placed her at number one on its 100 Sexiest Women list in 2014, and Glamour topped its best-dressed list with her the same year. In January 2013 she hosted Saturday Night Live, and in 2017 she hosted Jimmy Kimmel Live! for an episode on the 2nd of November. During Raf Simons's tenure at Dior, she became a celebrity ambassador for the brand and appeared in its advertising for fashion and perfumes. She frequently wears Dior on red carpets, and she wore a custom Dior bridal gown on her wedding day.

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• 8. Causes and Private Life

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  Lawrence voted for John McCain in the 2008 presidential election, having been raised by conservative Republican parents. She later joined the Democratic Party. Her work abroad showed her that not enough money seemed to reach the people who most needed it. "Nobody likes to see half their paycheck go away," she said, but "for the greater good, I guess it makes sense." During the Obama administration, she realized that voting Republican meant voting against her own rights. In 2015 she said Donald Trump's election would "be the end of the world." She endorsed Joe Biden in 2020 and Kamala Harris in 2024.

  She identifies as a feminist and argues the word should not intimidate anyone, "because it just means equality." In 2015 she wrote an essay for Lenny Letter criticizing the gender pay gap in Hollywood, citing her own lower pay on American Hustle compared with her male co-stars. At the 2024 GLAAD Media Awards, she criticized conversion therapy by saying her "first love" was gay and adding, "I tried to convert him for years." In a 2015 interview with Vogue, she condemned Kentucky county clerk Kim Davis for opposing same-sex marriage. In 2021, while pregnant, she attended the Rally for Abortion Justice in Washington, D.C. Standing beside Amy Schumer, she held a sign reading "Women can't be free if they don't control their bodies."

  The Jennifer Lawrence Foundation, launched in 2015, supports charities including the Boys & Girls Clubs of America and the Special Olympics. In 2016 she donated $2 million to Kosair Children's Hospital in Louisville to set up a cardiac intensive care unit named after the foundation. She organized an early screening of The Hunger Games: Catching Fire for Saint Mary's Center, a Louisville disabilities organization, and raised more than $40,000. With co-stars Josh Hutcherson and Liam Hemsworth she partnered with the United Nations to publicize poverty and hunger, and with them she created Prank It FWD for the nonprofit DoSomething. She is a board member of RepresentUs, which seeks anti-corruption laws in the United States. In 2018 she worked with 300 women in Hollywood to set up the Time's Up initiative against harassment and discrimination.

  At the Cannes press conference for Die My Love, reporters asked about the conflict in Gaza despite a festival moderator's attempt to steer them away from politics. Lawrence described the situation as "no less than a genocide" and said it "terrified" her. She urged attendees to "stay focused on who is responsible" rather than directing anger at actors and artists. Her remark seemed to refer to a recent letter signed by nearly 4,000 film industry workers.

  In an interview with Oprah Winfrey, Lawrence recounted praying for her life on an airplane that had suffered an engine failure: "I don't know if you're out there, but if you are, please, please save the airplane." In 2017 she called herself spiritual but not religious, rejecting the label of atheist. She still prays out of habit, "just not to anyone specific."

  During filming of X-Men: First Class in 2010, Lawrence began dating her co-star Nicholas Hoult. Their relationship ended around the time they wrapped X-Men: Days of Future Past, in August 2014. That year she was among the victims of a celebrity nude photo leak. She called it a "sex crime" and a "sexual violation," and said viewers of the images should be ashamed of themselves. The photos had been intended for Hoult, and unlike other victims she did not plan to sue Apple Inc.

  In September 2016 she began dating Darren Aronofsky, whom she met while filming Mother!, and they broke up in November 2017. In 2018, actress Laura Simpson introduced her to Cooke Maroney, an art gallery director. They became engaged in February 2019 and married on the 19th of October 2019, at the Belcourt of Newport mansion in Rhode Island. They have two sons, born in 2022 and 2025, and divide their time between Lower Manhattan and Beverly Hills.

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