Elizabeth Maresal Mitchell known professionally as Elizabeth Banks is an American actress . Banks had her film debut in the low budjet independent film Surrender Dorothy.
Actress Elizabeth Banks born on 10 Febuary 1974 in Pittsfield a small city in the Berkshires in Westren Massachusetts near the New York border . She describes herself as having been seen as a goody two shoes in her youth who was nominated to be the local Harvest Queen.
Banks left home to attend college at the University of Pennsylvania from which she graduate Magna cum Laude and went on to attend the advanced Trainiung Progarmm at the prestigious American conservatory Theatre in San Frncisco from which she graduate in 1998. She then moved to NewYork and worked in the theatre as well as obtaining her first roles on screen small parts in movies and guest star roles on television . Seeking more roles on screen work Banks moved to Los Angeles and the supporting roles soon came and required that she change her name to avoid confusion with anoither actress named Elizabeth Mitchell who had already established her self.
FILMOGRAPHY
Her first signal success came in her delightful, brief performance inSpider-Man (2002), for which she is best known despite subsequent leading roles, as "Betty Brant", the secretary of the cantankerous newspaper tycoon. (Banks has reprised the role in the Spider-Man series.)
Banks followed up her performance in Spider-Man with small roles in other movies released that year, Swept Away (2002) and Steven Spielberg's Catch Me If You Can (2002), in which she plays a bank clerk who assists the young Frank Abagnale with vital information about bank checking policies. More recognition came with Seabiscuit (2003), in which Banks charmed audiences playing the wife of Seabiscuit's owner "Charles Howard", and Banks was able to broker these successes into leading roles, in Michael Showalter's The Baxter (2005) andJames Gunn's Slither (2006).
The winsome, beautiful Banks projects an exceptionally-charming screen presence that has drawn comparisons to Audrey Hepburn. Though her off-screen vocabulary is at times sprinkled with Valley-speak, her performances demonstrate solid acting skill and a keen intelligence. Banks and her boyfriend since college days, Max Handelman, married in 2003.
PERSONAL QUOTES
I really think that we do a disservice to young people in America by not being more open about sex. Abstinence programs do not work. It's a natural, physical thing having sex.
I'm pleased that Hollywood hasn't figured out how to pigeonhole me yet..."
I love physical comedy. I love Oscar Wilde, I love Shakespeare comedies, I love improv. I knew I had a knack for it at a certain level, but I came into this business as a classically trained drama student and that was my reputation. When you live in a leading lady's body, which I do, you have to constantly prove that you are funny.
Every once in a while I play a true idiot, and they're really fun to play.