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Karen Allen
At the 2006 Dallas Comic Con. Photo by Corey Bond.
Birth name	Karen Jane Allen
Born	October 5, 1951 (1951-10-05) (age 55) Carrollton, Illinois, U.S.
Years active	1978 â€" present
Spouse(s)	Kale Browne (1988-1998)

Karen Jane Allen (born October 5, 1951) is an American actress most famous for her roles in the films National Lampoon's Animal House (1978), Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981), Starman (1984), and The Sandlot (1993).

Biography

Early life

Allen was born in Carrollton, in rural central Illinois, to Carroll Thompson Allen, an FBI agent, and Patricia A. (Howell), a teacher.[1] Allen spent her first 10 years traveling around the country with her parents and two sisters. After graduating from high school at 17, she moved to New York to study art and design at Fashion Institute of Technology. She later attended the University of Maryland, College Park and spent time traveling through South and Central America. In 1974, Allen joined a theater group and three years later moved back to New York and studied at the Lee Strasberg Theater Institute.

Career

In 1978, Allen made her major film debut in National Lampoon's Animal House and Hollywood took notice. Her next two appearances were in The Wanderers in 1979 and A Small Circle of Friends in 1980, where she played one of three radical college students during the 1960s. The United Artists-release of that film received only limited theatrical exposure, ultimately grossing under $1 million.[2] Her next big role came with Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981), in which she played the feisty heroine Marion Ravenwood. Allen won a Saturn Award for Best Actress in a film for her role in the film.

Allen also debuted on Broadway in 1982's The Monday After The Miracle. After a few small films including Until September (1984), directed by Richard Marquand, and other stage appearances, she made the successful science fiction film Starman (1984). She often took breaks from movie roles to concentrate on stage acting.

1988 saw Allen return as Bill Murray's long-lost love Claire Philips in the Christmas comedy Scrooged. In 1990, she also portrayed crew member Christa McAuliffe in the controversial movie Challenger, based on the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster.

Allen subsequently appeared in Spike Lee's Malcolm X (1992), The Perfect Storm (2000), and In the Bedroom (2001), and made guest appearances on television's Law & Order (1996) and Law & Order: Special Victims Unit (2001). She also starred in the short-lived series The Road Home (1994), and portrayed the character of Dr. Clare Burton in the video game Ripper (1996).

On July 26, 2007 at ComicCon 2007 it was revealed that she will once again portray Marion Ravenwood in the upcoming Indiana Jones 4 movie. An on-set photo of Karen with director Steven Spielberg has been posted on The Official Indiana Jones Website.

Personal life

After dating Patrick Moore, Allen then in 1988 married actor Kale Browne (who portrayed Christa McAuliffe's husband, Steven, in Challenger) and gave birth to her first child, Nicholas, in 1990.

After his birth, Allen took smaller roles in TV and films in order to concentrate on raising Nicholas. Given her affinity for knitting, in 2003 she started her own textile company, Karen Allen Fiber Arts in Great Barrington, Massachusetts. She also teaches acting at Simon's Rock College of Bard, which is also located in Great Barrington.

References

External links

• Karen Allen Fiber Arts: The official website for actress Karen Allen
• Karen Allen: An ACME Page
• Karen Allen at the Internet Movie Database
• Karen Allen at the Internet Broadway Database