Embeth Jean Davidtz was born August 11, 1965 in Lafayette, Indiana. When she was still young, the family moved to Trenton, New Jersey first before settling to their native home in South Africa. Davidtz had to study the Afrikaans language before she was able to attend classes. She graduated from Glen High School in 1983 and was a !$#!# laude at the Rhodes University, where she took up Drama & English Literature.
Her career in acting began at the age of 21 when she starred in the stage production of Romeo & Juliet and got good reviews. Davidtz was part of other theater productions namely Stille Nag (Silent Night) and A Chain of Voices. Her performance on both plays earned her a nomination at the South African version of the Tony Awards. After landing on roles for South African films and TV shows, she eventually moved to Los Angeles to pursue a career in the entertainment industry.
Her first American film was Army of Darkness, where she played the role of Shiela. Her work on the thriller movie Deadly Matrimony impressed Steven Spielberg so much that he chose her to play Helen Hirsch in the Oscar winning film Schindler's List. Among her other big screen projects are Murder in the First, Matilda, Bicentennial Man, 13 Ghosts, Bridget Jones Diary and Winged Creatures to name a few. Some of her notable TV appearances were on Scrubs, Citizen Baines and Grey’s Anatomy. In 2008, she joined the cast of the HBO drama In Treatment. Her character is Amy, who struggled with infertility for five years until she gave up. Davidtz later signed on for a role in Winged Creatures, playing Lydia Jaspersen.
Embeth Davidtz was featured in South African magazine DEKAT, UK magazines Empire and Evening Standard Hot Tickets and in US magazines Vanity Fair, Madison and Movieline. She later got married to lawyer Jason Sloane; they have two children namely Charlotte Emily and Asher Dylan.
(Photo courtesy of HBO)