Biography
Date of Birth
1 December 1989, Sacramento, California, USA
Birth Name
Brianne Sidonie Desaulniers
Height
5' 6¾" (1.7 m)
Mini Biography
Brie Larson has built an impressive career as an acclaimed television actress, rising feature film star and emerging recording artist. A native of Sacramento, Brie started studying drama at the early age of 6, as the youngest student ever to attend the American Conservatory Theater in San Francisco. She starred in one of Disney Channel's most watched original movies, Right on Track (2003), as well as the WB's Raising Dad (2001) and MGM's teen comedy Sleepover (2004) - all before graduating from middle school.
Brie's work includes the coming-of-age drama Tanner Hall (2009) and the dark comedy, Just Peck (2009), with Marcia Cross and Keir Gilchrist. She earned critical praise for her role in the independent feature, Remember the Daze (2007) (aka "The Beautiful Ordinary"), singled out by Variety as the "scene stealer" of the film, opposite Amber Heard and Leighton Meester.
Brie garnered considerable acclaim for her series regular role of "Kate", Toni Collette's sarcastic and rebellious daughter, in Showtime's breakout drama United States of Tara (2009), created by Academy Award-winning writer Diablo Cody and based on an original idea by Steven Spielberg.
She starred in The Trouble with Bliss (2011) opposite Michael C. Hall, playing a young girl out to seduce him while, in turn, teaching him more about his own life. She also starred in Universal's Scott Pilgrim vs. the World (2010) and Noah Baumbach's Greenberg (2010). In Scott Pilgrim vs. the World (2010), Brie played rock star "Envy Adams", former flame of Michael Cera, and in Greenberg (2010), she starred as a young temptress trying to flirt with Ben Stiller, a New Yorker traveling West to try to figure out his life.
In addition to her talents as an actress, Brie has simultaneously nurtured an ever-growing musical career. At 13, Brie landed her first record deal at Universal Records with Tommy Mottola, who signed her sight-unseen. Her first release in 2005 led to a nationwide tour.
Trivia
Besides acting, she is also a professional singer.
Sang "Coming Around" in her movie Hoot (2006).
Read the book "Hoot" before she had read the screenplay.
Moved to Los Angeles, California, right before her ninth birthday (1998).
First job was performing in sketches on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno (1992). Soon after, was cast in the television series, Schimmel (2000), which was announced in 2000 but never aired, since right before filming, Robert Schimmel was diagnosed with cancer. After being "on hold" for six months, Fox canceled the show.
In May 2005, she went on tour with Jesse McCartney.
Daughter of Heather (Edwards) and Sylvain Desaulniers. Her paternal grandparents were Aurèle Desaulniers and Gabrielle Marie-Therese (Chatelain) Desaulniers (1931-2015), who were French-Canadians from Winnipeg. Her mother's family is based in California. Her mother has English, Swedish, German, Welsh, and Scottish ancestry. Brie's stage surname, "Larson", is after her matrilineal great-grandmother, Elva Josephine Larson.
Brie's go-to karaoke song is Usher's "Burn" from the album "Confessions" (2004).
Has acted since she was seven years old. However, she considered quitting acting several times as she found the film business to be too difficult and was unable to get the roles she wanted. She pursued careers in photography, interior design and animal training, but ultimately decided to stick with acting.
Was in a relationship with Alex Greenwald, vocalist with rock band Phantom Planet, (2013-2019).
To prepare for her role as Ma in Room (2015), she stayed at home for a whole month and went on a strict diet, to get an understanding of what Ma and Jack were going through.
Is a huge fan of the Super Mario Bros video games.
Shared the cover of Vanity Fair magazine's 2016 Hollywood issue with, Jane Fonda, Viola Davis, Cate Blanchett, Jennifer Lawrence, Rachel Weisz, Lupita Nyong'o, Charlotte Rampling, Alicia Vikander, Gugu Mbatha-Raw, Helen Mirren, Diane Keaton and Saoirse Ronan. Photographed by Annie Leibovitz.
Released a pop album "Finally Out of P.E." (2005), which flopped by selling only 3,500 copies. Larson even toured with Jesse McCartney for Teen People's Rock in Shop Tour. Larson performs a cover of the song "Black Sheep" by the band Metric in the film Scott Pilgrim vs. the World (2010), but the soundtrack version features the original song by Metric.
Was the 146th actress to receive an Academy Award; she won the Best Actress Oscar for Room (2015) at The Oscars (2016).
After a considerable period of frustration correcting people who consistently mispronounced her birth name "Desaulniers", Brie changed it to Larson after her Kirsten Larson doll that she owned as a youngster.
Older sister of Raya Milaine Desaulniers (born January 5, 1993).
(March 2016-January 2019) was engaged to Alex Greenwald after he proposed to her shortly after she won her Academy Award.
Is one of 14 actresses to have won the Academy Award, BAFTA Award, Critics' Choice Award, Golden Globe Award and SAG Award for the same performance. The others in chronological order are Julia Roberts for Erin Brockovich (2000), Renée Zellweger for Cold Mountain (2003), Reese Witherspoon for Walk the Line (2005), Helen Mirren for The Queen (2006), Jennifer Hudson for Dreamgirls (2006), Kate Winslet for The Reader (2008), Mo'Nique for Precious (2009), Natalie Portman for Black Swan (2010), Octavia Spencer for The Help (2011), Anne Hathaway for Les Misérables (2012), Cate Blanchett for Blue Jasmine (2013), Patricia Arquette for Boyhood (2014) and Julianne Moore for Still Alice (2014).
When Larson presented the Best Actor Oscar to Casey Affleck for his work in Manchester by the Sea (2016) at the 2017 Oscars (the previously year's Best Actress always presents the current year's Best Actor awards and vice versa) she politely handed him the award but did not clap or cheer for his win and looked unhappy about it. Larson later confirmed rumors that she was un-celebratory over Affleck's win due to his real life history of sexual harassment accusations and settled lawsuits, telling an interviewer that "what I did on stage speaks for itself" and that she would not discuss the matter any further.
Attended the March 2017 ceremony for her Kong: Skull Island (2017) co-star John Goodman when he received his star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, alongside Jeff Bridges and Tom Hiddleston.
Is good friends with Jennifer Lawrence, Emma Stone and Amy Schumer.
Became close friends with Shailene Woodley during the filming of The Spectacular Now (2013). Larson was having dinner at Woodley's rented apartment when she got the call offering her the lead role in Short Term 12 (2013).
Made home movies as a child, casting her cousins and making sets in her garage.
Daughter of Sylvain (born December 15, 1962) and Heather (née Edwards) Desaulniers (born June 18, 1965). Both were born and raised in the state of California.
Maternal granddaughter of Bob Edwards (born 1939), born in the state of California, and Bonnie (née Hunt) Merrill (born 1940), born in the state of Utah. They married in 1960 and divorced in 1972.
Maternal great granddaughter of James (1911-1949) and Elva (née Larson) Hunt (1915-1997). Both were born and raised in the state of Utah.
She is a big fan of the Metroid game series and has expressed interest in playing the main character Samus Aran in a possible movie adaption.
Suffers from a severe allergy to cats, a condition that plagued her somewhat during the Captain Marvel (2019) production shoot.
For her movie "Captain Marvel", she insisted on having ankle-length body-armor as her character's primary costume; according to Larson, "I just couldn't see myself strolling around in a bathing suit for two hours and change" (referring to Carol Danvers's red Kree uniform and black Warbird outfit, both of which bared her legs).
She considers herself to be an introvert.
She has asthma.
She is a huge fan of Star Wars, so much that she wishes to appear somewhere in the franchise.
She is an avid gamer.
Her first gig was a commercial parody sketch "Malibu Mudslide Barbie" for The Tonight Show with Jay Leno in late 1996 at age 7. The sketch had her pouring mud on top of Barbie dolls as their heads popped off. She appeared in several more commercial parodies on Leno in the following years, including "Roadkill Easy Bake Oven" in 1998, and in other Leno show sketches, including one playing a girl scout.
Screen-tested for the role of Sarah Connor in Terminator Genisys (2015), but didn't get the role because the casting director said they didn't think she could carry a gun; they didn't ask her to hold a gun during the audition.
Auditioned for the role of Carmen Cortez in Spy Kids (2001).
Auditioned for the role of Katniss Everdeen in The Hunger Games (2012).
Auditioned for the role of Casey Newton in Tomorrowland (2015).
Auditioned for the role of Penny in The Big Bang Theory (2007), but was told she was too young for the part.
Auditioned for the role of Carol Gerber in Hearts in Atlantis (2001).
Doesn't like auditioning for horror movies because you have to mime and react a lot.
Auditioned for the role Cindy Paulson in The Frozen Ground (2013). She overacted her audition scene to the point that she scared the casting director.
Auditioned for two Disney Channel Original Movies: Brink! (1998) and Smart House (1999). In both instances, she lost to the same actress, Katie Volding.
Born on a Sunday at 6:41pm-PDT.
She has starred in 4 movies with Samuel L Jackson which include, Kong: Skull Island (2017), Unicorn Store (2017), Captain Marvel (2019), Avengers Endgame (2019). Also meaning they have both been in the Marvel Cinematic Universe and the Monsterverse.
On July 2, 2020, she started her own YouTube channel.
Trademarks:
Small mole under her left eye
Bright smile
Light and energetic personality
Lean and athletic figure
Quotes
It's very scary to allow the world to see you.
It's really hard to see yourself and to recognize that you are a human being like everybody else. You just think everybody's judging you.
I'm so used to swimming with the piranhas. And they're really not that bad.
I was the type of person that would show a PowerPoint presentation about why I should do something versus crying and screaming over it.
I was three when I told my mom that I knew what my dharma was and that I wanted to be an actor.
I have a sister and her name is Mimsy, like from "Alice in Wonderland", so we've got some strange names in our family.
I didn't go to prom--I was home-schooled.
For some reason, chewing gum for me gets my brain going.
For me, the dumbest rule is that you can't chew gum in school.
I know how to have a conversation, but I've never done improv. I've never taken improv classes.
Singing is an incredible expression and something that is important to me, but where I feel comfortable with how much I reveal about myself is acting. I enjoy the characters, the costumes, the wigs and just being a chameleon.
Maybe you're not perfect, but you're willing to actually look at yourself and take some kind of accountability. That's a change. It might not mean that you can turn everything around, but I think there's something incredibly hopeful about that.
In the past I've been very into the falling part, very into the swimming in the dark, deep emotional water. Rampart (2011) I really went into it and it took me three times as long to get out of that depression as it did to just do the scenes. I had to learn to give it my all and then go home and laugh.
I'm learning with the older that I get that some feelings are just universal and that I'm not the only one who hates their hair or their life at times.
I wasn't interested in going to the school dances. I wasn't interested in going to the football games. What I wanted was to be in my room painting my walls and doing weird stuff. That's what I wanted and I got to do what I wanted, so that, to me, is my high school experience.
I was home-schooled, was always very close with my mom and was very straight-laced and square. I was never the rebellious one, and I never threw hissy fits.
I think more things are becoming socially acceptable. I think that just by having more media, whether that's TV or Internet, we're able to see more things.
I think it starts to feel really redundant when you start to do something the same way over and over again. I don't think it's good to become so dependent on a certain writing process.
I know that I'm an actor and I guess I could kind of put on an act, but it takes so much more time to be someone you are not. I feel so much better just being comfortable with myself and hopefully girls will accept that.
I had a tough time fitting in, as I guess most kids do. I felt like school was kind of a grand opportunity to figure yourself out and to figure out what you wanted.
I didn't have a regular school experience and wanted a more abstract way of learning. I started exploring in lots of different creative ways. It gave me the opportunity to travel and play music, so it was good for me.
Whenever you want something that you're not going to get, suddenly the whiny three-year-old comes out in you.
Sometimes I laugh with my parents, and sometimes I yell at them, and both are therapeutic.
[on Emma Stone] She is never afraid to show us the most difficult thing you can show the world: yourself. What that entails is not always pretty. But with Emma, it is real, and it is beautiful.
[on the anti-feminist backlash against 'Captain Marvel'] I don't feel any pressure to represent my gender. That shouldn't even be a factor. It's just a movie.
