Jennifer Lawrence

Jennifer Lawrence (birthname: Jennifer Shrader Lawrence) can claim to be the most successful female screen actor of her generation, and the first born in the 1990s to win the Best Actress Oscar. Her stellar and lucrative career is partly based on her two recurring starring and co-starring roles in two blockbuster franchises—as Katniss Everdeen in The Hunger Games and as Raven/Mystique in X-Men.

Lawrence’s feature debut was a supporting role in writer-director Jason Freeland’s indie drama, Garden Party (2008), followed by Lawrence scoring a co-lead position in the first movie written (with David Alan Grier) and directed by actor Lori Petty, The Poker House (2008, later titled Behind Closed Doors), with Selma Blair, Bokeem Woodbine, David Alan Grier, and Chloë Grace Moretz, with Lawrence winning her first acting prize for outstanding performance at the Los Angeles film festival.

Lawrence co-starred with Charlize Theron and Kim Basinger in director-writer Guillermo Arriaga’s drama, The Burning Plain (2008), a commercial and critical dud. By contrast, Jennifer Lawrence enjoyed an astounding career breakthrough with her next starring role as Ree in Debra Granik’s acclaimed indie drama, based on Daniel Woodrell’s novel, Winter’s Bone (2010), with John Hawkes, Dale Dickey, Garret Dillahunt, and Tate Taylor, and which premiered at the Sundance film festival, where the movie won the grand jury prize, followed by four Oscar nominations—including a Best Actress nod for Lawrence, which made her the second-youngest actor at the time to receive the honor.

Lawrence returned to Sundance in a co-starring role opposite Anton Yelchin and Felicity Jones in director-writer Drake Doremus’ Like Crazy (2011), marking Lawrence’s second movie in a row to win Sundance’s grand jury prize. Director-star Jodie Foster cast Lawrence with Mel Gibson and Yelchin in the Kyle Killen-written drama, The Beaver (2011), premiering at the South by Southwest Film Festival but failing at the box office in the wake of Gibson’s battery scandal.

Jennifer Lawrence had her first role in a major studio franchise as Raven/Mystique in the $354 million-grossing X-Men: First Class (2011), directed by Mathew Vaughn, with James McAvoy, Michael Fassbender, Rose Byrne, January Jones, Oliver Platt, and Kevin Bacon. Lawrence resumed her character in the $746-grossing X-Men: Days of Future Past (2014), directed by Bryan Singer, and with new cast members Hugh Jackman, Halle Berry, Anna Paquin, Elliot Page, Peter Dinklage, Ian McKellan, and Patrick Stewart.

Lawrence continued her Mystique marathon in the $544-million-grossing X-Men: Apocalypse (2016), again directed by Singer, and with new cast members Oscar Isaac, Nicholas Hoult, Tye Sheridan, Sophie Turner, and Oliva Munn. Lawrence’s last turn as Raven/Mystique was in the $252-million-grossing X-Men bomb, Dark Phoenix (2019), directed and written by the debuting Simon Kinberg, and with new cast members Alexandra Shipp and Jessica Chastain.

Jennifer Lawrence’s other major franchise role was perhaps more significant for her star trajectory: As Katniss Everdeen, first in the $694.4 million-grossing The Hunger Games (2012), co-written (with Hunger Games novelist Suzanne Collins and Billy Ray) and directed by Gary Ross, with Josh Hutcherson, Liam Hemsworth, Woody Harrelson, Elizabeth Banks, Lenny Kravitz, Stanley Tucci, and Donald Sutherland, with Lawrence scoring multiple critics prizes for her performance.

Lawrence came back for the $865-million-grossing sequel under Francis Lawrence’s direction, The Hunger Games: Catching Fire (2013), with new cast members Woody Harrelson, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Amanda Plummer, Jena Malone, and Jeffrey Wright. Jennifer Lawrence’s third appearance as Katniss followed with the $755.4-million-grossing The Hunger Games: Mockingjay—Part 1 (2014), director Francis Lawrence’s first half of the two-part epic finale, with the second film’s cast returning. Lawrence capped her run as Katniss—which made her the highest-paid actor in the world—with the $653.4-million-grossing finale, The Hunger Games: Mockingjay—Part 2 (2015), again directed by Francis Lawrence and continuing the cast of the previous entry.

Jennifer Lawrence’s other streak beyond these two franchises was her continuing co-starring collaborations with writer-director David O. Russell, starting with the hit, awards-laden comedy, Silver Linings Playbook (2012), co-starring Bradley Cooper, Robert De Niro, Jacki Weaver, Anupam Kher, and Chris Tucker, with Lawrence becoming the second-youngest Best Actress Oscar winner in history—among the movie’s eight Oscar nominations, including Best Picture, Director, and Adapted Screenplay, and marking a near-sweep for Lawrence of best actress awards from the Golden Globes and the SAG Awards.

Lawrence reunited with Russell and co-star Cooper for the dazzling, $251-million-grossing black comedy, American Hustle (2013), inspired by the FBI’s legendary ABSCAM sting operation in the 1970s and 1980s, and featuring Christian Bale, Amy Adams, Jeremy Renner, Louis C.K., Michael Peña, and Alessandro Nivola, and earning a whopping ten Oscar nominations, including a Best Supporting Oscar pick for Lawrence. In her first starring, non-ensemble role with filmmaker Russell, Jennifer Lawrence starred in the $101-million-grossing biopic, Joy (2015), with De Niro, Edgar Ramirez, Diane Ladd, Virginia Madsen, Isabella Rossellini, and Cooper, earning Lawrence her third Best Actress Oscar nomination in six years.

Many of Jennifer Lawrence’s movies apart from the franchises and with David O. Russell have tended to be less noticed, starting with House at the End of the Street (2012), with Max Theriot, Gil Bellows, and Elisabeth Shue, and making a profit with $44 million. Lawrence’s movie with co-star Bradley Cooper but not with filmmaker David O. Russell was a dud–Serena (2014), directed by Susanne Bier, with Rhys Ifans, Toby Jones, Sean Harris, and Ana Ularu.

Lawrence then enjoyed a hit as star of Sony Pictures’ $303-million-grossing sci-fi drama, Passengers (2016), directed by Morten Tyldum and co-starring Chris Pratt, with Michael Sheen, Laurence Fishburne, and Andy Garcia. In one of her most striking performances in a role meant to be viewed as an allegory for Mother Earth, Jennifer Lawrence played the title role in writer-director Darren Aronofsky’s stark, highly theatrical domestic drama from Paramount Pictures, Mother! (2017), co-starring Javier Bardem, Ed Harris, Michelle Pfeiffer, Domhnall Gleeson, and Kristen Wiig.

Lawrence then reunited with director Francis Lawrence for the $151.6 million-grossing spy thriller, Red Sparrow (2018), with Joel Edgerton, Matthias Schoenaerts, and Jeremy Irons. For the first time, Lawrence joined prolific director-writer-producer Adam McKay as co-star for his climate change-themed allegorical black comedy, Don’t Look Up (2021), with the stellar ensemble of Leonardo DiCaprio, Rob Morgan, Jonah Hill, Cate Blanchett, Meryl Streep, Mark Rylance, Tyler Perry, Timothée Chalamet, Ron Perlman, and Ariana Grande.

Like Don’t Look Up, the fine drama, Causeway (2022), directed by Lila Neugebauer and co-written by acclaimed novelist Otessa Moshfegh, was a hybrid of limited theatrical release (A24) and streaming release (Apple TV+) which marked Lawrence’s first movie as star and producer, in which she played opposite Brian Tyree Henry (Oscar-nominated for Best Supporting Actor), Linda Emond, and Jayne Houdyshell. In a change of pace, Lawrence starred in one of her lighter projects, the $82.6-million-grossing sex comedy, No Hard Feelings (2023), with Andrew Barth Feldman, Natalie Morales, and Matthew Broderick.

Jennifer Lawrence’s busy career continued with writer-director Gary Ross’ ambitious screen adaptation of John Steinback’s classic, East of Eden (date to be announced), followed by Lawrence working with filmmaker Lynne Ramsay on the intimate, France-set psychological drama, Die, My Love (date to be announced).

Under Morgan Spurlock’s direction, Lawrence portrayed legendary super-agent, Sue Mengers, in the biopic, Sue (date to be announced). Then Lawrence starred in director Luca Guadagnino’s screen version of Hannah Kent’s crime drama, Burial Rites (date to be announced). The next world-class filmmaker to collaborate with Jennifer Lawrence was Italian maestro Paolo Sorrentino for his English-language mafia movie (written by Angelina Burnett and Teresa Carpenter), Mob Girl (date to be announced).