Joan Cusack Bio
Joan Mary Cusack (born October 11, 1962) is an American actress known for her distinctive voice, comic timing, and character work in film and television. Born in New York City and raised in Evanston, Illinois, she studied at the University of Wisconsin–Madison before breaking into acting in 1979. Over a career spanning more than four decades, she has earned multiple award nominations, including two Academy Award nominations and five Primetime Emmy nominations, with a win in 2015.
Cusack is recognized for memorable roles in films such as Toys (1992), Addams Family Values (1993), Nine Months (1995), School of Rock (2003), and Kit Kittredge: An American Girl (2008), as well as her voice work as Jessie in the Toy Story franchise. She is the sister of actor John Cusack and the daughter of actor and filmmaker Dick Cusack.
Early Life and Background
Joan Mary Cusack was born on October 11, 1962, in New York City. She was raised in Evanston, Illinois, a suburb of Chicago. Her mother, Ann Paula “Nancy” Cusack (née Carolan), was a mathematics teacher and political activist, and her father, Dick Cusack, was an actor and filmmaker. Cusack grew up in a Catholic family of Irish descent.
Two of her four siblings, Ann Cusack and John Cusack, are also actors. The household was steeped in artistic and civic engagement, which shaped her early interest in performance. Cusack later attended the University of Wisconsin–Madison, where she earned a bachelor’s degree in English in 1984.
Path to Acting
Cusack began her career in 1979 while still a teenager, building experience in theater and on screen. She went on to join the cast of the NBC sketch show Saturday Night Live during its eleventh season in 1985–1986, where she worked alongside future stars such as Robert Downey Jr., Damon Wayans, and Anthony Michael Hall. Her recurring characters on the program included the socially awkward Salena, and she performed celebrity impersonations of Brooke Shields, Jane Fonda, and Queen Elizabeth II.
She continued to take on a variety of supporting and leading roles in film throughout the 1980s and early 1990s. Her training in sketch comedy and her family background in acting gave her the foundation to develop a reputation for playing neurotic, endearing, and often eccentric characters.
Joan Cusack Career
Early Career (1979–1990)
Cusack made her earliest screen appearances in the early 1980s, including a role in the film Class (1983). She went on to appear in Sixteen Candles (1984), Grandview, U.S.A. (1984), and Broadcast News (1987), frequently working alongside her brother John Cusack. Her breakout performance came with the comedy-drama Working Girl (1988), in which she starred opposite Melanie Griffith and Harrison Ford.
For her work in Working Girl, Cusack received her first Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress. She also earned an American Comedy Award for Funniest Supporting Actress in a Motion Picture for the role, establishing her as a reliable and recognizable presence in Hollywood comedies and dramas.
Breakthrough (1991–2000)
Throughout the 1990s, Cusack built a steady career with starring roles in Toys (1992), Addams Family Values (1993), and Nine Months (1995). In Addams Family Values, she played the psychotic serial killer Debbie Jellinsky, a memorable comedic performance that highlighted her flair for dark humor.
She received her second Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress for her work in the romantic comedy In & Out (1997), and she also appeared alongside her brother John Cusack in Grosse Pointe Blank (1997) and Cradle Will Rock (1999). That same year, she voiced Jessie in Toy Story 2 (1999), a role that would become one of her most iconic.
Mature Career (2001–2010)
Cusack took on the lead role in the short-lived ABC sitcom What About Joan? in 2001 and appeared in the thriller Arlington Road (1999). In 2003, she played Rosalie “Roz” Mullins, the principal of Horace Green Elementary School, in School of Rock, one of her most widely recognized live-action roles. She also lent her voice to Abby Mallard in Chicken Little (2005) and narrated the children’s series Peep and the Big Wide World (2004–2011).
In 2008, she starred in Kit Kittredge: An American Girl, and she reprised her role as Jessie in Toy Story 3 (2010). Across this period, she continued to balance live-action family films with voice work and television guest appearances, including a guest spot on Law & Order: SVU in 2010.
Shameless and Recent Work (2011–Present)
In 2010, Cusack joined the Showtime drama-comedy Shameless as Sheila Jackson, a role she played from 2011 to 2015. For this performance, she received five consecutive Primetime Emmy nominations and won the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Guest Actress in a Comedy Series in 2015.
She voiced Jessie again in Toy Story 4 (2019) and Toy Story 5 (2026), and she appeared as Justice Strauss in Netflix’s A Series of Unfortunate Events, which premiered in 2017. Other recent projects include the Netflix holiday film Let It Snow (2019), where she played the Tin Foil Lady, and a role in the teen drama The Perks of Being a Wallflower (2012) as the therapist Dr. Burton.
Notable Works and Milestones
Cusack’s signature work spans the Toy Story franchise as the voice of Jessie, the comedy hit School of Rock, and the Showtime series Shameless. She is a two-time Academy Award nominee and a Primetime Emmy Award winner, and she has also received an Annie Award for her voice performance in the Toy Story films.
Joan Cusack Award Nominations
Joan Cusack has earned multiple award nominations across her career in film and television. She has been nominated twice for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress, for Working Girl (1988) and In & Out (1997), and she has received five Primetime Emmy Award nominations, including four consecutive nominations for Outstanding Guest Actress in a Drama Series for Shameless, followed by nominations in 2014 and 2015 for Outstanding Guest Actress in a Comedy Series.
Joan Cusack Awards Won
Cusack won the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Guest Actress in a Comedy Series in 2015 for her role as Sheila Jackson in Shameless. She has also won three American Comedy Awards for Funniest Supporting Actress in a Motion Picture, for Working Girl (1988), In & Out (1997), and Runaway Bride (1999), as well as the New York Film Critics Circle Award and the Broadcast Film Critics Association Award for Best Supporting Actress for In & Out. In addition, she received an Annie Award for her voice performance as Jessie in the Toy Story franchise.
Joan Cusack Family
Joan Cusack is the daughter of Dick Cusack, an actor and filmmaker, and Ann Paula “Nancy” Cusack, a mathematics teacher and political activist. She has four siblings, including her sister Ann Cusack, also an actress, and her brother John Cusack, a well-known film actor. The Cusack family is of Irish descent and raised their children in a Catholic household in Evanston, Illinois.
Personal Life
Joan Cusack married attorney Richard Burke in 1996, and the couple has two sons. The family owns a home in Three Oaks Township, Michigan, and lives in Chicago, Illinois. Since 2011, Cusack has owned Judy Maxwell Home, a gift shop in Old Town, Chicago, named after the Barbra Streisand character in What’s Up, Doc? (1972), which she has cited as her favorite movie.