Description:
Sigourney Weaver was born Susan Alexandra Weaver, on October
8, 1949, in Leroy Hospital in New York City. Her father, TV producer Sylvester
L. Weaver Jr., originally wanted to name her Flavia, because of his passion
for Roman history (he had already named her elder brother Trajan). Her mother,
Elizabeth Inglis, was a British actress who had sacrificed her career for a
family. Sigourney grew up in a virtual bubble of guiltless bliss, being taken
care by nannies and maids. By 1959 the Weavers had resided in 30 different households.
In 1961 Sigourney began attending the Brearly Girls Academy, but her mother
moved her to another New York private school, Chapin. Sigourney was quite a
bit taller than most of her other classmates (at the age of 13 she was already
5' 10"), resulting in her constantly being laughed at and picked on; in
order to gain their acceptance, she took on the role of class clown.
In 1962 her family moved to San Francisco briefly, an unpleasant
experience for her. Later they moved back east to Connecticut, where she became
a student at the Ethel Walker School, facing the same problems as before. In
1963 she changed her name to "Sigourney", after the character "Sigourney
Howard" in F. Scott Fitzgerald's "The Great Gatsby (her own birth
name, Susan, was in honor of her mother's best friend, explorer Susan Pretzlik).
Sigourney had already starred in a school drama production of "A Midsummer
Night's Dream", and in 1965 she worked during the summer with a stock troupe,
performing in "A Streetcar Named Desire" and "You Can't Take
It With You" (she didn't star in the latter because she was taller than
the lead actor!). After graduating from school in 1967 she spent some months
in a kibbutz at Israel. At that time she became engaged to reporter Aaron Latham,
but they soon broke up.
In 1969 Sigourney enrolled in Stanford University, majoring
in English Literature. She also participated in school plays, especially Japanese
Noh plays. By that time she was living in a treehouse, alongside a male friend,
dressed in elf-like clothes! After completing her studies in 1971, she applied
for the Yale School of Drama in New York. Despite appearing at the audition
reading a Bertolt Brecht speech and wearing a rope-like belt, she was accepted
by the school but her professors rejected her, because of her height, and kept
typecasting her as prostitutes and old women (whereas classmate Meryl Streep
was treated almost reverently). However, in 1973, while making her theatrical
debut with "Watergate Classics", she met up with a team of playwrights
and actors and began hanging around with them., resulting in long-term friendships
with Christopher Durang, Kate McGregor-Stewart and Albert Innaurato.
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