Julianna Margulies

Julianna Luisa Margulies (born June 8, 1966) is an American actress who rose to prominence portraying nurse Carol Hathaway on the NBC medical drama ER from 1994 to 2000 and briefly in 2009, a role that earned her the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Drama Series in 1995, along with two Screen Actors Guild Awards. She later achieved further acclaim starring as attorney Alicia Florrick in the CBS legal drama The Good Wife from 2009 to 2016, securing two Primetime Emmy Awards for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama Series in 2011 and 2014, as well as a Golden Globe Award. Over her career, Margulies has amassed eight Screen Actors Guild Awards and numerous nominations, establishing her as one of television's most awarded performers for dramatic roles emphasizing complex, resilient female characters. In addition to television, she has appeared in films such as Ghost Ship (2002) and Snakes on a Plane (2006), though her defining work remains in serialized prestige dramas. Margulies has occasionally drawn attention for outspoken views, including criticisms of perceived antisemitism and insufficient support for Israel within Hollywood and certain activist communities amid the 2023 Israel-Hamas conflict, comments that prompted backlash despite reflecting broader debates on selective solidarity.

Julianna Luisa Margulies was born on June 8, 1966, in Spring Valley, New York, to parents of Ashkenazi Jewish descent whose families had emigrated from Eastern Europe, including Romania, Austria, Hungary, Latvia, and Russia. Her paternal grandmother, Henrietta Margulies, was a Holocaust survivor, part of a family history that included experiences of persecution amid the Shoah's devastation of Jewish communities in those regions.

Her father, Paul Margulies, was an advertising executive, writer, and philosopher who created campaigns such as the Alka-Seltzer "Plop, Plop, Fizz, Fizz" jingle. Her mother, Francesca (née Goldberg, later Gardner), worked as a ballet dancer, eurythmy instructor, and proponent of anthroposophy, a philosophical system emphasizing artistic and spiritual development.

Margulies' parents divorced when she was one year old, prompting a nomadic upbringing divided between her father's home in the United States and her mother's pursuits across Europe, including periods in England and France. This peripatetic lifestyle, spanning continents and exposing her to diverse cultural environments, introduced early instability but also immersion in her mother's ballet milieu, sparking an initial affinity for performative arts amid frequent relocations.