Ellen Page Biography

Ellen Grace Philpotts-Page (born February 21, 1987), known professionally as Ellen Page, is a Canadian actress. Her career began with roles in Canadian television shows including Pit Pony, Trailer Park Boys, and ReGenesis. Page starred in the 2005 drama Hard Candy, for which she won the Austin Film Critics Association's Award for Best Actress. Her breakthrough role was the title character in Jason Reitman's comedy film Juno (2007), for which she received nominations for Academy Award, BAFTA, Golden Globe and Screen Actors Guild Award for Best Actress, and won awards including the Independent Spirit Award, MTV Movie Award and Teen Choice Award for Best Actress Comedy.

Page portrayed Kitty Pryde in the X-Men series of films. She also appeared in the crime-drama film An American Crime (2007); the drama The Tracey Fragments (2007), a role that won her the Vancouver Film Critics Award for Best Actress; Smart People (2008); the sports-comedy-drama film Whip It (2009); Super (2010); and Inception (2010). She also provided the voice acting, motion capture, and likeness for the character Jodie Holmes in the video game Beyond: Two Souls (2013).

Early life

Page was born and raised in Halifax, Nova Scotia, the daughter of Martha Philpotts, a teacher, and Dennis Page, a graphic designer. She attended the Halifax Grammar School until grade 10, spent some time at Queen Elizabeth High School, and graduated from the Shambhala School in 2005. She also spent two years in Toronto, Ontario, studying in the Interact Program at Vaughan Road Academy, along with close friend and fellow Canadian actor Mark Rendall. Growing up, Page enjoyed playing with action figures and climbing trees.

Career

Page first acted in front of the camera in 1997 at age ten in the CBC television movie Pit Pony, which later spun off into a television series. This led to more roles in several small Canadian films (including Marion Bridge, her first feature film role) and in television series, notably playing Treena Lahey in season two of Trailer Park Boys. At 16, she was cast in Mouth to Mouth, an independent film shot in Europe. Page starred in the 2005 movie Hard Candy as a young girl who takes a pedophile hostage, and won praise for "one of the most complex, disturbing and haunting performances of the year."

Page appeared in X-Men: The Last Stand (2006) and X-Men: Days of Future Past (2014) as Kitty Pryde, a girl who can walk through walls. In the previous X-Men movies, the part had been used in brief cameos played by other actresses, but never as a main character. Page was nominated for the Teen Choice Award for Choice Movie Scene Stealer for the role.

Page portrayed the title character in the 2007 film Juno. Film critic A. O. Scott of The New York Times described her as "frighteningly talented" and Roger Ebert said, "Has there been a better performance this year than Ellen Page's creation of Juno? I do not think so." Page was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actress, but lost to Marion Cotillard in La Vie en Rose. She also earned nominations at all the other major awards including the Golden Globe, BAFTA and Screen Actors Guild The role, however, did win her more than 20 awards, including a Canadian Comedy Award, an Independent Spirit Award, and a Satellite Award besides the likes of numerous Critics awards including Detroit Film Critics Society, Austin Film Critics Association and Florida Film Critics Circle.

Page also co-starred in Smart People, which premiered at the 2008 Sundance Film Festival. Shot before Juno, but released afterwards, the film saw her playing overachieving daughter to Dennis Quaid college professor character. Page's other film credits include An American Crime, which premiered at the 2007 Sundance Film Festival; The Tracey Fragments, which was released in November 2007 in Canada and May 2008 in the US; and The Stone Angel.

In 2007, she was attached to play the title character in an adaptation of Charlotte Bront Jane Eyre and had planned to work on an as-yet unmade film entitled Jack and Diane opposite Olivia Thirlby, with whom she co-starred in Juno, but it was announced in August 2009 that her role in Jack and Diane would be played by the actress Alison Pill. Before his death in January 2008, Heath Ledger had discussed with Page the idea of starring in his directorial debut, The Queen's Gambit.

In 2008, she was ranked #86 on FHM Sexiest Women in the World list, and placed at #93 for 2009. In June 2008, Page was listed in Entertainment Weekly future A-List stars list. Page hosted Saturday Night Live on March 1, 2008. On May 3, 2009, she guest starred in the episode "Waverly Hills 9-0-2-1-D'oh" of the animated series The Simpsons as a character named Alaska Nebraska, a parody of Hannah Montana. She also starred in Drew Barrymore's directorial debut, Whip It, alongside Juliette Lewis, Marcia Gay Harden, Drew Barrymore and Kristen Wiig. The film premiered at the 2009 Toronto International Film Festival and had its wide release on October 2, 2009.

She featured in Michael Lander's film Peacock, opposite Cillian Murphy, Susan Sarandon, Bill Pullman and Josh Lucas, which was released in 2010 despite an original release date of 2009. In August 2009, Page began shooting the big-budget Christopher Nolan thriller Inception, alongside co-stars Leonardo DiCaprio, Marion Cotillard, Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Ken Watanabe. The film was released on July 16, 2010. She has starred in the film Super, and was announced to be playing Stacie Andree in a film about Laurel Hester, finally released in 2015 as Freeheld.

As of 2010, she serves as a spokesperson for Cisco Systems in a series of advertisements, appearing in three commercials set in Lunenburg, Nova Scotia. On May 26, 2010, it was reported in a column on "Deadline Hollywood" and by Entertainment Weekly that Page will star in the new HBO series Tilda alongside Diane Keaton, who plays the title role. Tilda is based on the life of Nikki Finke, the founder of the influential Hollywood blog, DeadlineHollywood.com. Tilda was reportedly dropped by HBO due to friction between the creators. She is also the narrator of the documentary on colony collapse disorder, Vanishing of the Bees, directed by Maryam Henein.

In April 2011, it was announced that Page would co-star in the Woody Allen film To Rome with Love alongside Jesse Eisenberg, Penlope Cruz, and Alec Baldwin. In June 2012, Quantic Dream announced a video game entitled Beyond: Two Souls in which Page and Willem Dafoe portray the protagonists Jodie Holmes and Nathan Dawkins, respectively. It was released on October 8, 2013, in North America. Page reprised her role as Katherine "Kitty" Pryde in X-Men: Days of Future Past (2014). In February 2013, Page confirmed that her directorial debut would be titled Miss Stevens and would star Anna Faris and be produced by Gary Gilbert, Jordan Horowitz and Doug Wald; the project eventually moved forward without Page, with scriptwriter Julia Hart replacing Page as the director. In December 2014, Page portrayed Han Solo in a staged reading of Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back.

Page co-starred in Zal Batmanglij's 2013 thriller film The East a movie inspired by the experiences and drawing on thrillers from the 1970s, alongside Brit Marling and Alexander Skarsgrd; Page replaced Felicity Jones, who had been attached to the project, but later dropped out. The same year she starred in Lynn Shelton's Touchy Feely alongside Rosemarie DeWitt. Page starred in the film Tallulah alongside her Juno costar, Allison Janney, and had two other releases slated for 2015, Canadian drama film Into the Forest and Peter Sollett's Freeheld.

Personal life

In 2008, Page was one of 30 celebrities who participated in an online ad series for US Campaign for Burma, calling for an end to the military dictatorship in Burma. She describes herself as a pro-choice feminist. She attended Buddhist school in her youth and practised meditation and yoga. She practices a vegan lifestyle, and PETA named her and Jared Leto the Sexiest Vegetarians of 2014. She is an atheist.

On February 14, 2014, Page came out as gay during a speech at the Human Rights Campaign's "Time to Thrive" conference in Las Vegas. In 2014, Page was included as part of The Advocates annual "40 Under 40" list.

In September 2015, Page confirmed that she is in a relationship with artist and surfer Samantha Thomas, with whom she walked the red carpet for the world premiere of the film Freeheld at the Toronto International Film Festival. In October, she discussed their relationship on The Ellen DeGeneres Show.

Filmography

Films

Year	Title	Role	Notes
2002	'	Jocelyn	Short Film
2002	Marion Bridge	Joanie	ACTRA Maritimes Award for Outstanding Female Performance
2003	Touch & Go	Trish
2003	Love That Boy	Suzanna
2004	Wilby Wonderful	Emily Anderson	Atlantic Film Festival Atlantic Canadian Award for Outstanding Performance by an Actor - Female
2005	Hard Candy	Hayley Stark	Won - Austin Film Critics Association Award for Best Actress Nominated - Empire Award for Best Female Newcomer Online Film Critics Society Award for Best Breakthrough Performance
2005	Mouth to Mouth	Sherry
2006	X-Men: The Last Stand	Kitty Pryde / Shadowcat
2007	An American Crime	Sylvia Likens
2007	Juno	Juno MacGuff	Won - Alliance of Women Film Journalists Award for Best Breakthrough Performance Alliance of Women Film Journalists Award for Best Ensemble Cast Austin Film Critics Association Award for Best Actress Chicago Film Critics Association Award for Best Actress Detroit Film Critics Society Award for Best Actress Detroit Film Critics Society Award for Best Cast Florida Film Critics Circle Award for Best Actress Florida Film Critics Circle Pauline Kael Breakout Award Independent Spirit Award for Best Lead Female Las Vegas Film Critics Society Award for Best Actress MTV Movie Award for Best Female Performance National Board of Review Award for Best Breakthrough Performance - Female New York Film Critics Online Award for Best Breakthrough Performance North Texas Film Critics Association Award for Best Actress Oklahoma Film Critics Circle Award for Best Actress Oklahoma Film Critics Circle Award for Best Breakthrough Performance Phoenix Film Critics Society Award for Breakthrough On Camera Satellite Award for Best Actress - Motion Picture Musical or Comedy St. Louis Gateway Film Critics Association Award for Best Actress Teen Choice Award for Choice Movie Actress: Comedy Teen Choice Award for Choice Movie: Breakout Female Toronto Film Critics Association Award for Best Actress Utah Film Critics Association Award for Best Actress Washington D.C. Area Film Critics Association Award for Best Breakthrough Performance Nominated - Dallas-Fort Worth Film Critics Association Award for Best Actress Empire Award for Best Actress Houston Film Critics Society Award for Best Actress National Movie Award for Best Performance - Female Online Film Critics Society Award for Best Actress MTV Movie Awards - Best Kiss (Shared with Michael Cera) New York Film Critics Circle Award for Best Actress San Diego Film Critics Society Award for Best Actress Southeastern Film Critics Association Award for Best Actress Academy Award for Best Actress BAFTA Award for Best Actress in a Leading Role Broadcast Film Critics Association Award for Best Actress Golden Globe Award for Best Actress - Motion Picture Musical or Comedy Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Leading Role Broadcast Film Critics Association Award for Best Cast
2007	'	Tracey Berkowitz	Won - Atlantic Film Festival Canadian Award for Best Actress Vancouver Film Critics Circle Award for Best Actress Nominated - Genie Award for Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role
2007	'	Arlene Simmons
2008	Smart People	Vanessa Wetherhold
2009	Vanishing of the Bees	Narrator	Environmental documentary
2009	Whip It	Bliss Cavendar/Babe Ruthless
2010	Peacock	Maggie
2010	Inception	Ariadne	Won - MTV Movie Award for Best Frightened Performance Nominated - MTV Movie Award for Best Kiss (Shared with Joseph Gordon-Levitt) MTV Movie Award for Best WTF Moment (Shared with Leonardo DiCaprio) Central Ohio Film Critics Association Award for Best Ensemble Phoenix Film Critics Society Award for Best Ensemble Washington D.C. Area Film Critics Association Award for Best Ensemble Saturn Award for Best Actress
2010	Super	Libby / Boltie
2012	To Rome with Love	Monica
2013	The East	Izzy
2013	Touchy Feely	Jenny
2014	X-Men: Days of Future Past	Kitty Pryde / Shadowcat	Nominated - Teen Choice Award for Choice Movie: Scene Stealer
2014	Tiny Detectives	Detective Ellen	Short film
2015	Into the Forest	Nell	Also producer
2015	Freeheld	Stacie Andree	Also producer
2016	Tallulah	Tallulah
2016	Window Horses	Kelly (voice)
2016	My Life as a Zucchini	Rose (voice)	English dub
2017	Flatliners	Courtney	Post-production
2017	Mercy	Lucy	Post-production; also producer
2017	The Third Wave		Post-production
TBA	Robodog	Izzy (voice)	Post-production

Television

Year	Title	Role	Notes
1997	Pit Pony	Maggie Maclean	Movie Nominated - Young Artist Award for Best Performance in a TV Drama Series - Leading Young Actress Gemini Awards for Best Performance in a Children's or Youth Program or Series
1999-2000	Pit Pony	Maggie Maclean	29 episodes
2001-2002	Trailer Park Boys	Treena Lahey	5 episodes
2002	Rideau Hall	Helene	Episode: "Pilot"
2003	Homeless to Harvard	Young Lisa	Movie
2003	Going for Broke	Jennifer	Movie
2003	Ghost Cat	Natalie Merritt	Gemini Award for Best Performance in a Children's or Youth Program or Series
2004	'	Stella Blackstone	Movie
2004	ReGenesis	Lilith Sandstrm	8 episodes Gemini Award for Best Supporting Actress
2008	Saturday Night Live	Herself (host)	1 episode
2009	'	Alaska Nebraska (voice)	Episode: "Waverly Hills 9-0-2-1-D'oh"
2011	Glenn Martin, DDS	Robot Assistant (voice)	Episode: "Date with Destiny"
2011	Tilda	Carolyn	Failed pilot
2012	Family Guy	Lindsey (voice)	Episode: "Tom Tucker: The Man and His Dream"
2013	Out There	Amber (voice)	Episode: "Ace's Wild"
2016"?present	Gaycation	Herself (host)	Documentary series on Viceland Also executive producer Nominated - Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Unstructured Reality Program (2016} GLAAD Media Award for Outstanding Reality Program (shared} Pending - Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Unstructured Reality Program (2017}

Video games

Year	Title	Role	Notes
2013	Beyond: Two Souls	Jodie Holmes	Nominated - Spike TV VGX Best Voice Actress British Academy Video Game Award for Best Performer Behind the Voice Actors Award for Best Female Vocal Performance in a Video Game National Academy of Video Game Trade Reviewers (NAVGTR) Award for Best Lead Performance in a Drama

Awards and nominations

Year	Award	Work	Result
2000	Gemini Award for Best Performance in a Children's or Youth Program or Series	Pit Pony
2003	ACTRA Maritimes Award for Outstanding Performance - Female	Marion Bridge
2004	Atlantic Film Festival Canadian Award for Outstanding Performance by an Actor - Female	Wilby Wonderful
2006	Austin Film Critics Association Awards for Best Actress	Hard Candy
2007	Atlantic Film Festival Canadian Award for Best Actress	The Tracey Fragments
2008	Academy Award for Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role	Juno
2008	Golden Globe for Best Performance by an Actress in a Motion Picture - Comedy or Musical	Juno
2008	BAFTA Film Award for Best Leading Actress	Juno
2008	BAFTA Orange Rising Star Award	Herself
2011	MTV Movie Award for Best Scared-As-Shit Performance	Inception
2011	Saturn Award for Best Actress	Inception

See also

• List of former child actors from Canada