ve Dedeenot only in your face but down your throat." Wreaking havoc wherever she goes, Ricci's Dedee could easily have been an unsympathetic and nasty character, but the actress managed to convey the little girl beneath the surface chicanery and acerbic wit. It set a new standard in her work but not one the busy actress could not emulate.
Once graduated from the Professional Childrens School, Ricci seemingly worked non-stop, often in small but pivotal roles and always bringing the right tone and texture to them. In 1998 alone, she was a tap dancing kidnap victim forced to pretend to be her abductor's wife in Vincent Gallo's semi-autobiographical "Buffalo 66, played a Barbra Streisand-obsessed artist who meets up with a gonzo journalist in "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas" and the laundromat owner-girlfriend of a photographer who finds instant fame in John Waters' gently subversive comedy "Pecker. Continuing her streak, she filmed roles in several ensemble features, including Doug Liman's "Go, "I Woke Up Early the Day I Died, from an unproduced script by Edward Wood Jr., and "200 Cigarettes. Like a handful of others before, Ricci clearly made the transition from child performer to adult actor; with her natural talent, there seems little she can't do.
In 1999, Ricci appeared opposite Johnny Depp in Tim Burton's haunting rendition of "Sleepy Hollow." Her blond hair in the film was the first step Ricci took towards a new look. While she reverted back to her black hair, the once pleasantly voluptuous Ricci slimmed down to the typical Hollywood waif-like body, though she later admitted that she struggled with anorexia. In 2001, Ricci took on her first project as a producer with "Prozac Nation." Ricci also starred in the film, based on the book by Elizabeth Wurtzel, as a troubled young woman trying to deal with her depression and chemical addictions. The much-delayed film premiered at the Toronto film festival and was finally released in theaters in 2003 to little fanfare. In 2002, Ricci again produced and starred in the film "Pumpkin," a satire about a sorority girl who falls for a disabled man which also made very minor impact.
After detouring through a slate of minor indie thrillers ("Miranda" and "The Gathering"), Ricci took a highly publicized stint on the final season of TV's "Ally McBeal" (Fox, 1997-2002) as the provocative young attorney Liza Bump. She returned to the big screen as a neurotic actress who intentionally or unintentionally tortures smitten writer Jason Biggs in writer-director Woody Allen's "Anything Else" (2003), playing her role in the pitch-perfect tradition of Allen leading ladies Diane Keaton and Mia Farrow. After a turn in "I Love Your Work" (2003), the directorial debut of her then-beau, actor Adam Goldberg, Ricci received praise for her turn in the harrowing "Monster" (2003), based on the life of drifter and female serial killer Aileen Wournos (Charlize Theron). As Selby, the young lesbian lover who may or may not have turned a blind eye to Wournos' string of murders (a slightly fictionalized version of Wournos' real-life companion, who ultimately testified against her in court), Ricci had one of her most effective dramatic roles to date.
Ricci moved from "Monster" to a genuine monster movie, teaming with director Wes Craven and screenwriter Kevin Williamson in the werewolf thriller "Cursed" (2005). She also delivered a standout guest performance on the television medical drama "Grey's Anatomy" in its highly touted post-Super Bowl episode in 2006 as an inexperienced paramedic whose hand must remain inside a patient's chest to prevent an unexploded artillery shell from detonating. After making a brief, almost inconsequential appearance in Home of the Brave (2006), a heart-wrenching tale about a National Guard unit in Iraq sent on a final humanitarian mission before being sent back home to Spokane, WA, Ricci starred in Black Snake Moan (2007), playing a sexually abused and promiscuous woman who is chained to the radiator of a God-fearing blues singer (Samuel L. Jackson) looking for redemption by trying to save her soul.
Copyright © Baseline 2007.