Liza Weil Biography

Liza Rebecca Weil (born June 5, 1977) is an American actress. She is known for her role as Paris Geller in the television drama Gilmore Girls, and as former White House intern Amanda Tanner in the first season of the ABC series Scandal. She has starred on the web drama Anyone But Me and guest-starred on programs such as The Adventures of Pete & Pete, ER, Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, Grey's Anatomy, and The West Wing.

Early life

Weil was born in New Jersey to a family of actors. Her parents, Lisa and Marc Weil, toured Europe with their own comedy troupe, The Madhouse Company of London with her in tow. Weil had aspirations of becoming an archaeologist in her younger years, because of the Indiana Jones film trilogy and a childhood crush on Harrison Ford. In 1984, at the age of seven, her family settled down in suburban Lansdale, Pennsylvania, a community north-northwest of Philadelphia, where her parents continue to reside. In contrast to her Gilmore Girls character, Weil was a self-avowed average student in high school who focused more on her budding acting career than her studies. Weil traveled frequently to New York City for professional auditions, and acted in productions both off-Broadway and in Philadelphia's theatrical community before pursuing her film and television career. She is a 1995 graduate of the borough's North Penn High School.

Career

Weil continues to be active in the Los Angeles theatrical community during hiatuses, is a regular performer at the Ojai Playwrights Conference in early August and radio dramas with L.A. Theatre Works, and still occasionally performs in live theater in Philadelphia and New York. She has acted with every member of her family; in 2004, she headlined with her father in a well-received community theater production of Proof at the Montgomery Theater in Souderton, Pennsylvania, just north of her adopted hometown of Lansdale. Her first ever television role in 1994, which was an episode of The Adventures of Pete & Pete called "Yellow Fever", found her playing a bully alongside her mother Lisa, who played a teacher. Finally her younger sister Samantha shared the screen with Liza in Gilmore Girls's third season finale, "Those Are Strings, Pinocchio". Samantha Weil played a student named Bernadette (who was unrelated to Paris) making out a video yearbook entry in front of an impatient Paris, standing off to the side waiting to make her own.

An alumna of Columbia University, Weil received her first major feature film role co-starring with Kevin Bacon in Stir of Echoes. Before that role, she was the star of the 1998 independent film Whatever, and her first film in 1996 was the short film A Cure For Serpents, where she played the daughter of a mysophobic woman bringing to her home a boyfriend who was not as obsessive with cleanliness, and how the mother deals with the challenge. She has also done several other short and feature-length independent films, which include Motel Jerusalem, Scar, and Lullaby, and shown interest in behind-the-camera work.

Weil was originally considered for the role of Rory Gilmore by Gilmore Girls creator Amy Sherman-Palladino before Alexis Bledel won the role; the character of Paris Geller was created especially for Weil.

Current work

In 2006, Weil was featured in the horror themed short film Grace, in which her character suffers a miscarriage, yet decides to carry the baby to term with terrifying results. The film, which also featured Brian Austin Green, premiered at the Fangoria Weekend of Horrors convention on June 2, 2006, and is the basis for the 2009 feature film of the same name. She also had a minor role as a humane society worker in the Molly Shannon film Year of the Dog, and appeared as Doris Delay in the 2008 biographical film Neal Cassady, and as a reporter in the 2010 live-action rotoscoping film Mars, which is currently on the film festival circuit.

Weil also voiced a public service announcement which aired from June"October 2007 and aired on radio stations in Philadelphia and the Delaware Valley in support of the American Diabetes Association's Step Up to Fight Diabetes staircase climb event, which took place in Center City Philadelphia on October 20, 2007.

In 2009 Weil returned to her roots as a regular guest star in various television series, including appearances in Eleventh Hour, CSI, In Plain Sight, Grey's Anatomy and Private Practice and in February 2010 began a run as Dr. Glass on the popular Internet series Anyone But Me; series creator Susan Miller officiated at Weil's wedding to Paul Adelstein in 2006.

In March 2011 it was confirmed that Weil had signed for the role of Amanda Tanner, a White House intern, in Shonda Rhimes's pilot, Scandal, for ABC. It was picked up by the network for their midseason 2011-12 schedule on May 13, 2011, and Weil had a recurring, though critical role in the series' first season.

Weil played a supporting role in the horror film Smiley, and started 2013 as a recurring guest star in the last half of the only season of Amy Sherman-Palladino's ABC Family series Bunheads as Milly, the sister of Truly Stone.

Personal life

As of 2006, Weil resided in Santa Monica and is a film and movie buff. She married actor Paul Adelstein in a Jewish ceremony in November 2006. They had previously known each other through theatrical projects. The two have since acted together in three film projects, the 2007 short Order Up, the 2008 Gregory Dark-helmed Frenemy, and The Missing Person. She also appeared in an episode of Private Practice on February 24, 2011, although she and Adelstein had no scenes together.

Weil became pregnant in mid-2009 with her and Adelstein's first child, a girl named Josephine Elizabeth Weil-Adelstein, who was born around April 20, 2010. In 2006, she also became an aunt, when her sister Samantha had a child after she moved to the Los Angeles area.

Weil is left-handed, and a natural brunette, having that hair color through at least 2000; it is believed she was told to dye it dark-blonde for her Gilmore Girls role to contrast with Bledel/Rory's brown hair. After the series, she went back to her original brown hair color, though has subsequently returned to being a blonde. Amy Sherman-Palladino has complimented Weil's skin as "the best she's ever seen in her life".

Filmography

Film
Year	Film	Role	Other notes
1997	A Cure for Serpents	Lucy	short film
1998	Whatever	Anna Stockard
1999	Stir of Echoes	Debbie Kozac
2002	Dragonfly	Suicide Girl
	Lullaby	Rane
2006	Affair Game	Wife	Short film
	Grace	Madeline	Original 2006 short film; role was recast for Jordan Ladd in latter 2009 feature-length film
2007	Year of the Dog	Trishelle
	Order Up	Hippie Patron	Short film
	Neal Cassady	Doris Delay	exclusive to Amazon VOD
2008	Mars	Jewel
2009	Little Fish, Strange Pond aka. Frenemy	Norma	Direct-to-DVD
	The Missing Person	Agent Chambers
	Us One Night	Rebecca	Short film
2010	Metronome	Michelle	Short film
2011	A Glove Story	Claire	Short film
2012	Smiley	Dr. Jenkins
Television
Year	Title	Role	Notes
1994	The Adventures of Pete & Pete	Bully Margie Corsell	Episode: Yellow Fever Episode: 35 Hours
2000	The West Wing	Karen Larson	Episode: Take out the Trash Day
2000, 2002	ER	Samantha Sobriki	Episode: All in the Family Episode: The Fastest Year Episode: Beyond Repair
2000–2007	Gilmore Girls	Paris Geller	Listed as a 'special guest star' in the first season; was a regular cast member in seasons 2-7
2001	Law & Order: Special Victims Unit	Lara Todd	Episode: Tangled
2009	Eleventh Hour	Ashley Filmore	Episode: H20
	CSI: Crime Scene Investigation	Risa Varness	Episode: A Space Oddity
	In Plain Sight	Angela	Episode: Gilted Lily
	Grey's Anatomy	Allison Clark	Episode: Here's to the Future
2010	Anyone But Me	Dr. Glass	Web television series
2011	Private Practice	Andi	Episode: Two Steps Back
2012	Scandal	Amanda Tanner	recurring guest star in first season Episode: Sweet Baby Episode: Dirty Little Secrets Episode: Hell Hath No Fury Episode: Enemy of the State Episode: Crash and Burn Episode: The Trail
2013	Bunheads	Milly Stone	Episode: Channing Tatum is a Fine Actor Episode: I'll Be Your Meyer Lansky Episode: Take the Vicuna Episode: There's Nothing Worse Than A Pantsuit Episode: It's Not a Mint Episode: Next!