Jennifer Connelly is an American actress and model who has achieved success in both Hollywood and the fashion industry. Her career began in the early 1980s and she has since starred in numerous films, including Labyrinth, A Beautiful Mind, and Requiem for a Dream. Connelly has also won an Academy Award and two Golden Globe Awards. She has become a role model for many young women and is known for her strong female characters
Connery was born in the Catskill Mountains of Cairo, New
York. She is the daughter of Ilena, an antique dealer, and Gerard Carl
Connelly, a tailor. Her father is an Irish Catholic. Connery's mother was
Jewish and was educated in a Jewish school. All of Connelly's
great-great-grandparents were Jewish immigrants from Poland and Russia.
Connelly grew up primarily in Brooklyn Heights, near the Brooklyn Bridge, where
he attended St. Ann's College, a private school specializing in the arts. His
father suffered from asthma, so the family moved to Woodstock, New York in 1976
to escape the city's smog. Four years later, the family moved back to Brooklyn
Heights and Connery returned to St. Ann's. After high school, Connery studied
English literature at Yale University in 1988.
Connery described himself as a serious student who
"doesn't worry about social life, sleep or food. I'm super grumpy and
practically stuck in the law school library 24/7, most of the time I'm not in
class. After two years at Yale, Connelly moved to Stanford to study theater.
There he trained with Roy London, Howard Finn and Harold Guskin. Encouraged by
his parents to pursue a film career, Connelly dropped out of college that same
year and returned to the film industry.
