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Elizabeth Perkins was born in Queens, New York. She is a gifted actress who could become a major star in the 1990s, although that doesn't seem to be her primary motivation. Perkins raised eyebrows in her film debut, playing the cynical, acerbic girlfriend of Demi Moore in EB (1986), the adaptation of David Mamet's play "Sexual Perversity in Chicago." She has since accepted some "conventional" leading-lady assignments-costarring with Judd Nelson in From the Hip (1987) and, most notably, playing the love interest of man-boy Tom Hanks in Big (1988)-but is drawn to sometimes quirky characters, even if it means taking smaller supporting parts. Sweet Hearts Dance (1988) saw her in a secondary female role as the girlfriend of Jeff Daniels, while Avalon (1990) saw her tackling (very effectively) her first "domestic" role. She played a ditzy private eye in Love at Large (1990) and a volatile TV commentator paired with obnoxious Kevin Bacon in He Said, She Said (1991). Later that year, Perkins appeared in The Doctor as a young cancer patient who has lost her hair from chemotherapy; it was a showy turn that eclipsed the starring performances of William Hurt and Christine Lahti. But Perkins really sparkled in the little-seen Enid Is Sleeping (1990, retitled Over Her Dead Body for video release), an uneven but occasionally brilliant black comedy in which she apparently kills-accidentally, of course-her hated sister, who's been having an affair with her husband. (She later had a child with the film's director, Maurice Phillips.) Recent credits include Indian Summer (1993, another good young-character part) and her highest-profile role in years, that of Wilma Flintstone in The Flintstones (1994). She took the Maureen O'Hara role in the remake of Miracle on 34th Street.
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– Played Opal in the original pilot for the tv show M.Y.O.B. (2000) but the role was later re-cast.
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– Listed as one of twelve Promising New Actors of 1986 in John Willis' Screen World, Vol. 38.
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– Of Greek extraction
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– Best friend is Diane Lane.
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– Her mother, Pamela Perkins, was a carnival performer who was appearing at a Coney Island sideshow in the early 1960s when she was photographed by the great Diane Arbus. The Arbus portrait of Perkins' mother appeared in Look Magazine in 1963.
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– Her paternal grandparents were Greek immigrants who anglicized their surname from Pisperikos to Perkins when they moved to the United States.
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