Career
Sheedy started acting in local stage productions as a teenager. After appearing in several made-for-television films in 1981, as well as three episodes of the television series Hill Street Blues, she made her feature film debut in Bad Boys (1983), starring Sean Penn, where she played Penn's humiliated girlfriend. The 1980s were her most active period, with roles in popular films such as WarGames, The Breakfast Club, St. Elmo's Fire, Short Circuit, and Maid to Order.
Throughout most of the 1990s, Sheedy appeared in a number of television films. Her most notable film performance during this time was in High Art, a well-reviewed independent film released in 1998 about a torrid romance between two women. She identified with the character of photographer "Lucy Berliner" so much that she flew, at her own expense, to participate in an audition and has said that this character is the closest one to herself she has played. Her performance in High Art was recognized with awards from the Independent Spirit Awards, Los Angeles Film Critics Association, and National Society of Film Critics.
In 1999, Sheedy took over the lead role in the off Broadway production of Hedwig and the Angry Inch. She was the first female to play the part of the German transsexual "Hedwig," but her run ended early amid bad reviews. That same year, she was cast as a lead actress in Sugar Town, an independent film, which featured an ensemble cast of actors and musicians.
She was reunited with Breakfast Club co-star Anthony Michael Hall when she became a special guest star on his television show The Dead Zone, in the second-season episode "Playing God," from 2003.
Sheedy has also appeared in the episode "Leapin' Lizards" of C.S.I. in which she played a woman who murdered her boyfriend's wife while mixed up in a cult. On March 3, 2008, Sheedy was introduced as the character Sarah, in the ABC Family show Kyle XY. In 2009, she played the role of Mr. Yang on the USA Network television show Psych (in the third season finale), a role that she reprised in the fourth season finale and fifth season finale.
Read more about this topic: Ally Sheedy
Famous quotes containing the word career:
“I seemed intent on making it as difficult for myself as possible to pursue my “male” career goal. I not only procrastinated endlessly, submitting my medical school application at the very last minute, but continued to crave a conventional female role even as I moved ahead with my “male” pursuits.”
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“From a hasty glance through the various tests I figure it out that I would be classified in Group B, indicating “Low Average Ability,” reserved usually for those just learning to speak the English Language and preparing for a career of holding a spike while another man hits it.”
—Robert Benchley (1889–1945)
“Clearly, society has a tremendous stake in insisting on a woman’s natural fitness for the career of mother: the alternatives are all too expensive.”
—Ann Oakley (b. 1944)