Indie Queen

We all have ways of working through trauma in our lives and using those trials to learn and grow. For Maggie Gyllenhaal, acting is a part of that process.

Like many New Yorkers and Americans, she struggled to come to grips with the tragedy of Sept. 11. That included a backlash when she made comments about the attacks she says were misinterpreted to sound as if she felt New York and America deserved to be attacked, a sentiment she calls inconceivable. (While doing press for the 9/11-themed film The Great New Wonderful in April 2005 she was quoted saying the United States was “responsible in some way” for the attacks.) Playing Allison Jimeno—whose husband Will was a Port Authority officer pulled alive from the rubble—in Oliver Stone’s World Trade Center helped her come to terms with the event and her own reaction to it.

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Breaking Away

By Susan Thea Posnock



Hollywood loves comeback stories--real or fictional--and perhaps no actor fits the bill better this year than Jackie Earle Haley.

A child and teen star, he caught his first break at age five as the voice of Dennis the Menace in cartoons and Dairy Queen commercials. He went on to play pivotal roles in two classic 1970s flicks: The Bad News Bears as rebel slugger Kelly Leak and Breaking Away as Moocher, the diminutive friend with attitude, who famously (and literally) “punched in” a clock at work.

But like so many who've tasted that kind of success at an early age, Haley was unable to make a smooth transition into successful adult actor. Instead, he found himself relegated to the low-grade movie ghetto, then out of work and doing bit jobs that included limo driver to the stars and pizza delivery guy.
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