Biography for
Fairuza Balk More at IMDbPro »

Date of Birth

21 May 1974, Point Reyes, California, USA

Birth Name

Fairuza Alejandra Feldthouse

Nickname

Ru

Height

5' 3" (1.60 m)

Mini Biography

"Fairuza!" ("Turquoise" in Farsi) her father exclaimed as he saw her blue eyes: Fairuza Alejandra Balk had just been born, May 21, 1974. Her father, Solomon Feldthouse, was a traveling musician, and her mother Cathryn Balk was a belly dancer. Her parents split up soon after. Fairuza grew up just north of San Francisco, California, on a commune-type ranch. Her mother later found some work in Vancouver, British Columbia. it was there that Fairuza got her first acting job in a TV movie, at the age of nine.

Two years later it was off to the UK where she attended the Royal Academy of Ballet, the Ramona Beauchamp Agency and the Bush Davies Performing Arts School. Fairuza worked for The Walt Disney Company for a while - at age 11 she was chosen from out of 1,200 girls to play the part of Dorothy, starring in Return to Oz (1985). A year later she starred as, prophetically enough, The Worst Witch (1986) (TV), a harbinger of her breakout role in The Craft (1996) ten years later.

Fairuza and her mother remained in London until 1988, then headed to Paris where the 15-year-old starred in Valmont (1989). The next year they returned to Vancouver, where Fairuza enrolled in high school, but despite being a movie star, she was shy in class - she ended up doing correspondence courses. Back in Hollywood Fairuza starred in a string of movies, including Gas, Food Lodging (1992), for which she received an Independent Spirit Award for Best Actress.

Following further TV and film work, she achieved cult status with her starring role as a teenage witch in The Craft (1996), her breakout film. The same year she appeared in The Island of Dr. Moreau (1996), in which she did some belly dancing and attracted the attention of Lancashire, England-born co-star David Thewlis. They did another movie together, American Perfekt (1997).

Fairuza was also the love interest in the wildly popular The Waterboy (1998) and had a major role in American History X (1998). With a half-dozen movies for 2000, Fairuza is much in demand. Her interests are writing poetry and stories, playing the guitar, singing (her main enjoyment) and dancing. She lives in Venice, California, and has an apartment in New York City.

IMDb Mini Biography By: kdhaisch@aol.com

Mini Biography

Fairuza Balk began her career as a child on the ABC special The Best Christmas Pageant Ever (1983) (TV) and the Disney movie Return to Oz (1985). She attended the Bush Davies Performing Arts School in the UK for two and a half years, where she landed a series of jobs. She won a CableAce award as Best Actress for her role in the TV movie Shame (1988/I) and won the Independent Spirit Award for Best actress for Gas, Food Lodging (1992). She also starred in The Waterboy (1998) and American History X (1998).

IMDb Mini Biography By: Matt Dicker

Trivia

When she was born, her father took one look at her eyes and exclaimed "Firuze!" which is Farsi for "turquoise."

Once appeared as a vampire in a ZZ Top video.

Born at 3:00am-PDT

She once fully owned her own Occult Craft shop in California called Panpipes. In 2001, she sold 50% of the business to a co-owner. Later, she sold her remaining share of the store to the current owners.

Has nine tattoos and a nose ring.

Has a triangle-shaped tattoo on her shoulder because the soldiers of the Nazi regime branded the symbol on the Romany in concentration camps. This is her way of paying respect to her culture and remembering the suffering her ancestors endured.

Is of Persian and Romany heritage.

A 2002 Internet poll confirmed that fans' favorite movie she did was The Craft (1996)

She is dyslexic.

Enjoys listening to punk rock

Plays guitar and piano

Loves to read, and her favorite authors are William S. Burroughs, James Joyce, Oscar Wilde, Carl Jung, Isabel Allende, Mikhail A. Bulgakov, Ernest Hemingway, and Honoré de Balzac.

Ranked #88 in Stuff magazine's "102 Sexiest Women In The World" (2002)

Has Irish ancestry

Browse biographies section by name

A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z