Background:

American actress Mageina Tovah is notable for portraying Glynis Figliola in the television series “Joan of Arcadia” (2003-2005) and Ursula Ditkovich in the films “Spider-Man 2” (2004) and “Spider-Man 3” (2007). She took home a Method Fest Award for her scene stealing role as Jessica in the film “Dark Heart” (2006). Tovah also has appeared in other films like “The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie” (2004), “Sleepover” (2004), “Live!” (2007), “The Factory” (2011) as well as in many television series, including “American Horror Story,” “Hung,” “Bones,” “The Shield,” “Cold Case” and “Half & Half.”    


Magna Cum Laude

Childhood and Family:

Mageina Tovah Begtrup was born on July 26, 1979, in Honolulu, Hawaii, where her father was a US Army psychiatrist in the Green Berets, and her mother was an Army physical therapist. Her  family later moved to Clarksville, Tennessee and then to Nashville, where Mageina grew up. In Nashville, she attended Martin Luther King Junior Magnet High School for Health, Sciences and Engineering. Skipping a year of high school, bright Mageina took both her Junior year of honors English and her Senior year of AP English at the same time and graduated at the age of 16. She went on to spend a year in the BFA program at the California Institute of the Arts and later graduated Magna Cum Laude from University of Southern California.
    

Spider-Man 2

Career:

Mageina Tovah commenced her professional acting career in 2001, with guest spots in “The Guardian” and “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” and a small part as a young girl in the 12 minute length movie “Virus Man,” directed and co-written by José Pepe Bojórquez.   

Tovah appeared in the films “Dine & Shine” and “Reflections of Evil” (both 2002) and the short “Hope Abandoned” (2003), and made her television movie debut in “The Pool at Maddy Breaker's” (2003). She also appeared as guest star in the television series “NYPD Blue” (2002, as Anne Knepper), “Six Feet Under” (2003, as pink-haired girl) and “Boston Public” (2003) before scoring a notable recurring role as Glynis Figliola, Luke's friend and one-time girlfriend, on the CBS family drama series “Joan of Arcadia” (2003-2005). The show received kudos from critics on its initial release and won the prestigious Humanitas Prize and the People's Choice Award.

Tovah gained further notice when she landed the role of Ursula Ditkovich on Sam Raimi's “Spider-Man 2” (2004), the sequel to 2002's “Spider-Man.” The film earned highly positive reviews and won the Academy Award for Best Visual Effects. It grossed a total of over $783 million worldwide against a budget of $200 million.

The same year, Tovah also co-starred in Marek Probosz's film, “Y.M.I.,” opposite Owen Williams, Cy Carter and Andrew William Mariano Jr., had a bit part as a girl on phone on “Sleepover,” a teen movie directed by Joe Nussbaum and starring Alexa Vega and Sara Paxton, provided the voice of Usher on the well received animated film “The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie,” based on the popular Nickelodeon television series “SpongeBob SquarePants,” and played Rose Vendor on the short film “Do Geese See God?” He also appeared as Trinity in an episode of “Strong Medicine” called “Omission” and began her two episode role as Farrah on the season 3 of the FX hit show “The Shield.”

In 2005, Tovah co-starred with Christopher Masterson, Ajay Naidu, Jake Muxworthy, Jon Gries, Christopher Berry, Shabana Azmi  in the independent film “Waterborne,” playing Lillian. Directed and written by Indian American filmmaker Ben Rekhi, the film won the Special Audience Award at the SXSW Film Festival in 2005. Besides, she appeared as Laura Bennett in the 2005 episode “Death Goes On” of NBC's “Crossing Jordan.”

In 2006, Tovah won a Method Fest in the category of Best Supporting Actress for her portrayal of Jessica in the Kevin Lewis drama “Dark Heart.” The year also saw her have an uncredited part in “Failure to Launch,” a popular romantic comedy film starring Matthew McConaughey and Sarah Jessica Parker, and appeared with Patrick Fugit, Olivia Wilde, Fran Kranz and John Cho in the low budgeted movie “Bickford Shmeckler's Cool Ideas,” directed and written by Scott Lew. Meanwhile, on the small screen, she portrayed Priscilla Miller on the TV movie adaptation of “In from the Night,”     which was nominated for a Satellite Award for Best Motion Picture Made for Television, and guest starred in the UPN sitcom “Half & Half” and the CBS drama “Cold Case.”

In 2007, Tovah reprised her role as Ursula on “Spider-Man 3,” the last in the Sam Raimi “Spider-Man” trilogy. The film grossed $336,530,303 in North America and $554,341,323 in other territories for a worldwide total of $890,871,626. The same year, she also appeared in the Bill Guttentag drama “Live!” (starred Eva Mendes, David Krumholtz, and Eric Lively), which was released in April 2007 at the Tribeca Film Festival, as well as made guest appearances in the TV series “Standoff” and “Private Practice.”

Next up for Tovah, she could be seen in episodes of “Bones” (2009, as Madame Nina), “Lie to Me” (2009, Natalie), “Southland” (2010, as Misty), “Chase” (2010), “Breakout Kings” (2011, as Jill Kincaid), “The Mentalist” (2011, as Constance) and “American Horror Story” (2011, as Bianca). From 20100 to 2011, she played the recurring role of Christina in the HBO comedy series “Hung,” starring Thomas Jane. Additionally, she starred with John T. Woods and Rob Zabrecky in “Dream from Leaving” (2008), a film for the music of Clint Mansell, and portrayed Brittany in the thriller film “The Factory” (2011), directed by Morgan O'Neill and starring John Cusack and Jennifer Carpenter.

Recently, in 2012, Tovah played Kim Furtado in “Shameless”'s episode “I'll Light a Candle for You Every Day,” broadcast on January 22, and Joyce Weatherby in an episode of “The Finder” called “The Inheritance,” aired on April 27.  She also portrayed Sara Jerritt in “Neighbors,” a short film directed by Rachel Goldberg and starring Richard Epcar, Kelli Garner and Edi Gathegi. The film was seen at the Capital City Film Festival and the Nashville Film Festival both in April 2012.

Tovah will play the role of Ellen in the upcoming drama film “Decoding Annie Parker,” written and directed by Steven Bernstein. It will star Helen Hunt, Samantha Morton and Aaron Paul.        


Awards:

--- Show Less