Gothic Actors / Actresses
by WingedCreature | created - 19 Nov 2012 | updated - 24 Jan 2014 | PublicThe following film stars have been related to the Goth scene either because of the films they chose to star in, their fashion sense, their art or the people they associate themselves with.
Read more about Gothic films, actors and movies at the What is Goth website.
http://www.whatisgoth.com/pages/Goth-Film.html
1. Angelina Jolie
Actress | Maleficent
Angelina Jolie is an Academy Award-winning actress who rose to fame after her role in Girl, Interrupted (1999), playing the title role in the "Lara Croft" blockbuster movies, as well as Mr. & Mrs. Smith (2005), Wanted (2008), Salt (2010) and Maleficent (2014). Off-screen, Jolie has become ...
In Angelina's first marriage to Jonny Lee Miller she wore black leather pants and a white top with his name scrawled on the back in Jolie's own blood. In an interview with the Boston Globe, Jolie explains why she and Thornton wear vials of each other's blood around their necks. "Some people think a big diamond is really pretty," she says. "My husband's blood is the most beautiful thing in the world to me." The couple also sign their wills in blood the same year, and for a first-anniversary present, Jolie buys Thornton his-and-hers cemetery plots in his native Louisiana. People magazine once noted in a fun facts section of the magazine that as a child, Angelina Jolie wanted to be an undertaker and studied embalming.
2. Christina Ricci
Actress | Casper
Precocious, outspoken child-teen starlet of the 1990s, Christina Ricci was born on February 12, 1980 in Santa Monica, California, the youngest of four children of Sarah (Murdoch), a realtor, and Ralph Ricci, a lawyer and therapist. She is of Italian (from her paternal grandfather), Irish, and ...
Starred in Addams Family Values, Sleepy Hollow, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, Casper, Penelope, Pumpkin and Mermaids.
3. Marilyn Manson
Soundtrack | Detroit Rock City
Marilyn Manson was born Brian Hugh Warner on January 5, 1969 in Canton, Ohio, to Barbara Jo (Wyer) and Hugh Angus Warner. He has German and English ancestry. During his childhood, one of his neighbors molested him several times until the young Brian broke down one day and told his mother what ...
Starred in Party Monster, The Heart Is Deceitful Above All Things, Rise, Lost Highway, Jawbreaker. Dated Rose Mcgowan, Dita Von Teese and Evan Rachel Wood.
4. Helena Bonham Carter
Actress | Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street
Helena Bonham Carter is an actress of great versatility, one of the UK's finest and most successful.
Bonham Carter was born May 26, 1966 in Golders Green, London, England, the youngest of three children of Elena (née Propper de Callejón), a psychotherapist, and Raymond Bonham Carter, a merchant ...
Starred in Fight Club, Frankenstein, Alice in Wonderland, Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street, Corpse Bride, Big Fish, Henry VIII, Lady Jane, Howards End, A Room with a View, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Sixty Six and Hamlet. Married to Tim Burton.
5. Winona Ryder
Actress | Little Women
Winona Ryder was born Winona Laura Horowitz in Olmsted County, Minnesota, and was named after a nearby town, Winona, Minnesota. She is the daughter of Cynthia (Istas), an author and video producer, and Michael Horowitz, a publisher and bookseller. Her father's family is Ukrainian Jewish and ...
Starred in Dracula, Edward Scissorhands, Beetlejuice, Heathers, A Scanner Darkly, The Crucible and Girl, Interrupted and dated Johnny Depp.
6. Fairuza Balk
Actress | The Craft
"Fairuza!" ("Turquoise" in Farsi), her father exclaimed as he saw her blue eyes: Fairuza Alejandra Balk had just been born on May 21, 1974 in Point Reyes, California. Her father, Solomon Ben Feldthouse, was a traveling musician originally from Idaho, and her mother, Cathryn Balk, was a belly dancer...
Listens to Joy Division and starred in Return to Oz, The Craft and The Island of Dr. Moreau.
7. Maila Nurmi
Actress | Vampira
The original glamour ghoul herself, "Vampira", of late night 1950s television, was actually born Maila Syrjäniemi (later changed to the easier surname Nurmi) on December 11, 1922 in Gloucester, Massachusetts (not Finland as she often claimed). Her uncle was the multiple Olympic medal runner Paavo ...
A Finnish-American actress who created the campy 1950s character Vampira. She portrayed Vampira as TV's first horror host and in the Ed Wood cult film Plan 9 from Outer Space.
8. Theda Bara
Actress | A Fool There Was
Theda Bara was born in Cincinnati, Ohio, as Theodosia Goodman, on July 29, 1885. She was the daughter of a local tailor and his wife. As a teenager Theda was interested in the theatrical arts and once she finished high school, she dyed her blond hair black and went in pursuit of her dream. By 1908 ...
A very popular Edwardian silent film actress as well as a Goth fashion icon. She is known for her dark eye shadow. Her femme fatale roles earned her the nickname "The Vamp". She starred in Lady Audley's Secret, Carmen, Sin, The Devil's Daughter, A Fool There Was, Cleopatra, The Siren's Song and more.
9. Carolyn Jones
Actress | The Man Who Knew Too Much
Carolyn Jones was born April 28, 1930, in Amarillo, Texas. Her mother was Jeannette and her sister was Bette (Moriarty). She was an imaginative child, much like her mother. In 1934, her father abandoned the family and her mother moved them in with her parents, also in Amarillo. As a child Carolyn ...
The original Morticia Addams.
10. Musidora
Actress | Les vampires
Musidora was a French actress, film director, and writer. She is particularly remembered for portraying the vamp villainess Irma Vep in the crime serial film "Les Vampires" (1915-1916) and the gang leader Diana Monti/Marie Verdier in the revenge-themed film serial film "Judex" (1917). Her screen ...
A popular French silent film actress. She became famous for her vamp roles in such film serials as Les Vampires and Judex, in which she developed a persona comparable to that of Theda Bara. In addition to acting she directed and wrote many of her films.
11. Lily Cole
Actress | Snow White and the Huntsman
Lily began working as an actress when she was 6 years old, then returned to film when she was 16 in Marilyn Manson's adaptation of Alice in Wonderland. In 2009 she played the female lead in Terry Gilliam's The Imaginarium of Dr Parnassus. Since then she has made over fifteen films with esteemed ...
Starred in The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus. Set to star as Alice in Marilyn Manson's Phantasmagoria: The Visions of Lewis Carroll.
12. Rose McGowan
Actress | Planet Terror
Rose McGowan is an American actress and director, known for her contribution to independent film. Since the age of nineteen, she has appeared in acclaimed films by Gregg Araki, Wes Craven, Brian De Palma, Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino. In 2014, her directorial debut Dawn (2014) was ...
Listens to Cocteau Twins and PJ Harvey, dated Marilyn Manson and starred in Jawbreaker, Charmed, The Doom Generation and Marilyn Manson's Coma White video.
13. Cassandra Peterson
Actress | Elvira: Mistress of the Dark
Cassandra Peterson was born in Manhattan, Kansas, and grew up in Colorado Springs, Colorado. She began her career at age 17 as the youngest showgirl in Las Vegas history in the show "Vive Les Girls" at the Dunes Hotel. After receiving advice from "The King" himself, Elvis Presley, she traveled to ...
Elvira, Mistress of the Dark
14. Anjelica Huston
Actress | The Grifters
Anjelica Huston was born on July 8, 1951 to director and actor John Huston and Russian prima ballerina Enrica 'Ricki' Soma. Huston spent most of her childhood overseas, in Ireland and England, and in 1968 first dipped her toe into the world of show business, taking on the lead role of her father's ...
The more recent Morticia Addams.
15. David Bowie
Soundtrack | Labyrinth
David Bowie was one of the most influential and prolific writers and performers of popular music, but he was much more than that; he was also an accomplished actor, a mime and an intellectual, as well as an art lover whose appreciation and knowledge of it had led to him amassing one of the biggest ...
Starred in The Hunger, Labyrinth, Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me, The Man Who Fell to Earth and Basquiat.
16. Jennifer Connelly
Actress | A Beautiful Mind
Jennifer Connelly was born in the Catskill Mountains, New York, to Ilene (Schuman), a dealer of antiques, and Gerard Connelly, a clothing manufacturer. Her father had Irish and Norwegian ancestry, and her mother was from a Jewish immigrant family. Jennifer grew up in Brooklyn Heights, just across ...
Starred in Labyrinth, Dark City, Waking the Dead, Requiem for a Dream, House of Sand and Fog, Of Love and Shadows, The Adventures of the Rocketeer.
17. Natalie Portman
Actress | Black Swan
Natalie Portman is the first person born in the 1980s to have won the Academy Award for Best Actress (for Black Swan (2010)).
Natalie was born Natalie Hershlag on June 9, 1981, in Jerusalem, Israel. She is the only child of Avner Hershlag, an Israeli-born doctor, and Shelley Stevens, an ...
Starred in Leon: The Professional, V for Vendetta, Garden State, The Other Boleyn Girl, Mars Attacks, Beautiful Girls, Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, Snow and the Seven, Closer, Star Wars.
18. Pauley Perrette
Actress | NCIS: Naval Criminal Investigative Service
Pauley Perrette is known to millions around the world as Abby Sciuto, the brilliant but offbeat forensic scientist on CBS's NCIS (2003). Her additional credits include appearances on such shows as Almost Famous (2000), The Ring (2002), 24 (2001), CSI: Crime Scene Investigation (2000), Murder One (...
Starred in My First Mister and plays a Goth girl on NCIS.
19. Viggo Mortensen
Actor | The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King
Since his screen debut as a young Amish farmer in Peter Weir's Witness (1985), Viggo Mortensen's career has been marked by a steady string of well-rounded performances.
Mortensen was born in New York City, to Grace Gamble (Atkinson) and Viggo Peter Mortensen, Sr. His father was Danish, his mother ...
Starred in The Lord of the Rings (Aragorn), The Portrait of a Lady, The Reflecting Skin, The Prophecy, Crimson Tide and Psycho. Featured in the Goth magazine "Carpe Noctumn" in regards to his dark art.
20. Johnny Depp
Actor | Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl
John Christopher "Johnny" Depp II was born on June 9, 1963 in Owensboro, Kentucky, to Betty Sue Palmer (née Wells), a waitress, and John Christopher Depp, a civil engineer. He was raised in Florida. He dropped out of school when he was 15, and fronted a series of music-garage bands, including one ...
Starred in Edward Scissorhands, The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus, Sleepy Hollow, Alice in Wonderland, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street, Pirates of the Caribbean, The Libertine, From Hell, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, The Ninth Gate and Chocolat.
21. Evan Rachel Wood
Actress | Thirteen
Evan Rachel Wood was born September 7, 1987, in Raleigh, North Carolina. Her father, Ira David Wood III, is a theatre actor, writer and director, and her mother, Sara Wood, is an actress and acting coach. She has two older brothers--Dana Wood, a musician, and Ira David Wood IV, who has also acted. ...
Starred in Running with Scissors, True Blood and Thirteen. Dated Marilyn Manson.
22. Emily Browning
Actress | A Series of Unfortunate Events
Australian actress Emily Browning was born in 1988 in Melbourne, Australia, to Shelley and Andrew Browning. She has two younger brothers. Her start in acting came after a classmate's father, involved in the acting business, noticed her "acting all ditsy" in a school play. Emily found an agent and ...
23. Taylor Momsen
Actress | How the Grinch Stole Christmas
Taylor Michel Momsen is an American actress, singer and director from St. Louis, Missouri. She is known for playing Cindy Lou Who from How the Grinch Stole Christmas, Alexandra Anami in Spy Kids 2 and Jenny Humphrey from Gossip Girl. She is the leader of a punk rock band called The Pretty Reckless....
Personal Quotes:
"...life is not rainbows and butterflies."
"I think the Disney bubblegum *beep* that the world is living right now is pathetic."
"You can't face the world if you're not being you."
24. Noomi Rapace
Actress | Män som hatar kvinnor
Swedish actress Noomi Rapace was born in Hudiksvall, Gävleborgs län, Sweden to Swedish actress Nina Norén and Spanish Flamenco singer Rogelio de Badajoz (Rogelio Durán). Her parents did not stay together, and when she was five she moved to Iceland with her mother and stepfather, where she lived for...
Personal quote: "I'm interested in people's darker side, the ones that aren't easy and well balanced. The cracks."
Her ex-husband and her chose the surname Rapace after they were married; it means "bird of prey" in French.
25. Geoffrey Rush
Actor | The King's Speech
Geoffrey Roy Rush was born on July 6, 1951, in Toowoomba, Queensland, Australia, to Merle (Bischof), a department store sales assistant, and Roy Baden Rush, an accountant for the Royal Australian Air Force. His mother was of German descent and his father had English, Irish, and Scottish ancestry. ...
26. Leelee Sobieski
Actress | Never Been Kissed
Liliane Rudabet Gloria Elsveta Sobieski was born June 10, 1983 in New York City, New York. She is the daughter of Elizabeth Sobieski (née Salomon), a writer, and Jean Sobieski, a painter who has also acted. She has a younger brother, Robert. Her father, born in France, is of Polish and Swiss ...
27. Patricia Arquette
Actress | True Romance
With her expressive blue eyes, soft, Southern-tinged voice and an acting range that can carry her from hysterically funny to terrifying in seconds, Patricia Arquette is one of the most underrated and talented actresses of her generation. Though she has been working for years, she's always stayed ...
28. Eva Green
Actress | Casino Royale
French actress and model Eva Gaëlle Green was born on July 6, 1980, in Paris, France. Her father, Walter Green, is a dentist who appeared in the 1966 film Balthazar (1966). Her mother, Marlène Jobert, is an actress turned children's book writer. Eva's mother was born in Algeria, of French, Spanish,...
'There’s this shop in New York I go to, it has bones and fossils and insects that are like works of art. I have a few on my wall. Some people collect butterflies – I love beetles."
Eva Green, 31, is a woman of possibly more gothic tastes than her director (Tim Burton). It’s as apparent in her acting roles – she’s played several witches, power-hungry princesses and killers of various descriptions. - Telegraph Interview
29. Isabelle Adjani
Actress | Possession
Isabelle Yasmine Adjani was born in Gennevilliers, Hauts-de-Seine, a suburb of Paris, to Emma Augusta "Gusti" (Schweinberger) and Mohammed Adjani. Her father was a Kabyle Algerian, from Iferhounène, and her mother was a Bavarian German. She grew up speaking German fluently. After winning a school ...
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