Shawnee Smith

Shawnee Smith (born July 3, 1970) is an American film and television actress and singer. Smith is best known for her roles as Meg Penny in The Blob (1988), Amanda Young in the Saw films and Linda in the CBS sitcom Becker. Smith once fronted the metal band Fydolla Ho, with which she toured the United States and the United Kingdom, and is half of Smith & Pyle, a desert country-rock band, with actress Missi Pyle. --- Shawnee Smith was born in Orangeburg, South Carolina, the second child of Patricia, an oncology nurse, and Jim Smith, a financial planner and former US Air Force pilot. The family relocated from South Carolina to Van Nuys, California, when she was a year old; her parents divorced when she was two; and her mother remarried when she was eight. She attended Ranchito Avenue Elementary School in Panorama City, Los Angeles and Madison Jr. High in North Hollywood. Then attended North Hollywood High School in North Hollywood, California, and graduated in 1987. Smith began acting as a child appearing on stage in A Christmas Carol repertory from ages 8 to 11 and starred in a stage play with Richard Dreyfuss at age 15. She also performed in the original stage production of To Gillian on Her 37th Birthday and won the Dramalogue Critics Award for her performance. She was the youngest actor up to that time to receive such an honor. She made her television debut in a McDonald's commercial titled "Best Friends" in 1978. She joined the Screen Actors Guild at age nine and made her feature film debut in John Huston's 1982 adaptation of the Broadway musical Annie, as one of Aileen Quinn's fellow orphans. In 1985, Smith co-starred in two troubled-teen melodramas, Not My Kid and Crime of Innocence. In 1987, Smith co-starred in the hit comedy film Summer School as pregnant student Rhonda Altobello. The following year, she starred with Kevin Dillon and the late Joe Seneca in a 1988 remake of the Steve McQueen classic The Blobas Meg Penny. Smith played a rich teen who helps John Candy locate her kidnapped sister in 1989's Who's Harry Crumb?. That same year, she co-starred with Jennie Garth and Barbara Eden in the short-lived TV series Brand New Life. The following year, Smith co-starred as the daughter of Anthony Hopkins andMimi Rogers in the remake of Michael Cimino's thriller The Desperate Hours. Smith took a three-year break from acting in the early 1990s primarily because she had outgrown teenage roles and had a hard time finding work. During that time she climbed Mt. Kilimanjaro and competed in a triathlon. Near the end of the hiatus she decided to sell all her belongings and relocate to North Carolina to visit family and go back to school. When she was about to start attending classes she landed a small role in Leaving Las Vegas and has had steady work ever since. Smith's best-known television role was Linda, an air-headed nurse's aide, in the CBS hit comedy series Becker with Ted Danson. She served as a regular cast member in all 129 episodes from 1998 to 2004. Another well-known television role was that of Julie Lawry in the 1994 miniseries The Stand, based on the novel by Stephen King. She also appeared as a waitress in The Shining miniseries, which King adapted from his own novel. Besides her regular role on Becker and the cameos in the Stephen King miniseries, Smith made several guest appearances on television shows, such as Cagney & Lacey; Married With Children; Murder, She Wrote; The X-Files; Players; and Law & Order: Los Angeles. In 2003, she lent her voice to an episode of the Disney cartoon Kim Possible as Vivian Porter. --- Smith has three children: a daughter named Verve, born in 1999, from her marriage to photographer Jason Reposar (1998–2003), and a son named Jakson, born in 2005, from her brief marriage to musician Kai Mattoon (2005–2006), and a second son born in March 2010. Her daughter was named after Verve Records. Both Verve and Jakson were featured in the debut Smith & Pyle album, It's OK to be Happy. The kids are listed in the album credits as having vocals and spoken narrative tracks for two songs. An article published October 28, 2009, highlighting Smith & Pyle's small tour in West Virginia stated that Shawnee was pregnant with her third child. She gave birth to a boy in March 2010. Smith and ex-husband Jason Reposar eloped in 1998 while on vacation in Scotland due to the inability to organize a wedding. The song "Sugar," performed by her former country-rock band, Smith & Pyle, was written by Smith after her divorce from Reposar. She describes it as her break-up song that is quite different from Pyle's break-up song, "I Wish You Were Dead."