Who Is...

Who is Winona Ryder...

Born Winona Laura Horowitz on Oct. 29 1971 in Olmstead County, Minnesota. Her first name comes from the name of a town near where she was born. Her middle name Laura comes from the name of her parents friend, Laura Huxley.Her paternal grandparents came from Russia as immigrants, and he maternal grandparents came to the US from Romania. The family became friends with a number of famous names, including Timothy Leary (who was Winona's Godfather), beat poet Allen Ginsberg, and Lawrence Ferlinghetti.

At the age of seven, the Horowitz family moved to a commune near Elk, California. The location of the commune was remote, so Winona took up reading. It was at the commune, her mother showed her movies on a screen in the barn. It was watching these movies that started Winona's interest in an acting career.

When she was ten, the family moved to Petaluma, Calif., where when she joined the public school she was treated badly by a group of bullies that mistook her for a effeminate male. She was taken out of school and home-schooled after that incident. This is when she started going to the American Conservatory Theater in San Francisco, where she got her first acting lessons.

Her first movie role was in the 1986 movie "Lucas" as a friend to the main character. This is when she got the name Ryder, when asked how she wanted her name to appear in the credits she suggested the name Ryder because her father was listening to a Mitch Ryder album at the time.

Ryder's breakthrough hit came with the release of "Beetle Juice". A movie in which she played a main role along side big Hollywood talent like Geena Davis, Alec Baldwin and Micheal Keaton - who all played Ghosts. In the movie she is the only humyn that builds a relationship with the ghosts.

Ryder is best known for three movies, and one of the biggest is Heathers. Heathers released in 1989. In the movie she plays a disenchanted teenager that plays the forces that surround her against each other for her own gain.

The movie I most often think about in regards to Ryder is "Girl Interrupted", based on the book by Susanna Kaysen. She plays a young teenager that is experiencing depression and is sent to a mental hospital for a short time to sort things out. In this movie she plays along side such stars as Angelina Jolie and Brttany Murphy.

Other hit movies that she has been in include Edward Scissor Hands" with her then boy friend Johnny Depp. "Little Women", along stars like Kirsten Dunst, Claire Danes and Christian Bale. Her latest movie, "A Scanner Darkly" is based on a book by Phillip K. Dick.

In 1993 Ryder took an interest in the case of missing girl, Poly Klass. Klass had been taken from her home in Petaluma, where Ryder had lived for a short period while she was growing up. She offered a $200,000 reward for the childs safe retutn. After the death of Poly Klass, Ryder dedicated the movie she was working on at the time, "Little Women", to Klass's memory.

She was engaged to Johnny Depp for three years, during which time he got a tattoo that said "Winona forever", after their break-up he changed the tattoo to "wino forever". She has also had relationships with Matt Damon and Dave Pirner from Soul Asylum.