Sharon Stone

Sharon Stone is an Academy Award-nominated American actress who best known for her captivating performances in films like "Basic Instinct" (1992), "Casino" (1995), "The Muse" (1999), and "Alpha Dog" (2006). Stone grew up in a working class family in a small town in Pennsylvania. Her mother was a homemaker, while her father worked in a factory. As a child, Stone showed immense promise in the classroom, and was able to skip a few grades (her IQ would later be tested at 154). Stone proved such a gifted student, that she was able to graduate high school a few years early and enter college at the age of 15. She attended Edinboro University of Pennsylvania, but dropped out shortly after to pursue a modeling career.

From there, Stone entered and won a local beauty contest, which gave her the motivation to move to the epicenter of the American modeling industry: New York City. So, with her newly awarded beauty contest award in hand, the 17-year-old Stone packed her bags and moved in with her aunt in New Jersey, which was only a short rain ride to the big city.

She soon got a job working at McDonald's to play the bills, and before long had signed a modeling contract with the prestigious Ford Modeling Agency. After signing with Ford, the strikingly beautiful Stone appeared in a number of print ads and on commercials. However, she quickly realized that being a model wasn't for her, and, having loved black and white movies her entire love, primarily those numerous dance classics starring Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers, went with her heart by embarking on an acting career. Stone's first role was a small non-speaking part in Woody Allen's "Stardust Memories" (1980).

She followed that up with a small speaking part in the 1981 horror film "Deadly Blessing" (1981), before nabbing her first big break in 1983 with a recurring role on the TV series "Bay City Blues" "(NBC, 1983-84). That show, however, was cancelled during its first season. Undeterred, Stone continued nabbing acting work throughout the 1980s, most notably with parts in films like "King Solomon's Mines" (1985), "Police Academy 4: Citizens on Patrol" (1987), "Above the Law" (1988), and "Beyond the Stars" (1989).

Then in 1990 Stone appeared as the loving wife turned secret spy to Arnold Schwarzenegger's character in director Paul Verhoeven's science-fiction film "Total Recall" (1990). The film was a huge success with both audiences and critics, and put Sharon Stone on the map as an up-and-coming actress to watch.

Stone worked with Verhoeven once again in the 1992 erotic thriller "Basic Instinct" (1992). The film featured a much talked about racy scene involving an underwear-less Stone being interrogated by police, and in addition to being a huge hit at the box office, earned Stone a Golden Globe nomination for Best Actress. Stone's next big role came in 1995 when she starred as the druggy wife of Robert De Niro's character in Martin Scorsese's mobster epic "Casino" (1995). For her role in the film, Stone earned her first Academy Award nomination for acting.

After the highpoint of "Casino," Stone's career continued working steadily throughout the remainder of the 1990s and well into the 2000s. Some of her more notable performances during this period included "The Mighty" (1998), "If These Walls Could Talk 2" (HBO, 2000), "Cold Creek Manor" (2003), and "Alpha Dog."

Although she still continued making appearances in films, by the 2010s, as many in the industry began gravitating towards the small screen where creative freedom was abound, so did Stone. She was a castmember on the short-lived action drama "Agent X" (TNT, 2015), starred in director Steven Soderbergh's experimental drama series "Mosaic" (HBO, 2018), and joined the cast of HBO's "The New Pope" (HBO, 2019-2020), a follow-up to HBO's "The Young Pope" (HBO, 2016). In 2020 Stone also began appearing on the Netflix series "Ratched" (Netflix, 2020- ). The series was based on author Ken Kesey's much-beloved novel One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1962), and premiered on the streaming network in 2020.