FILMOGRAPHY

2006] Like Minds
2006] Little Miss Sunshine
2006] The Night Listener
2005] In Her Shoes
2004] The Last Shot
2004] Connie and Carla
2004] Providence
2003] Japanese Story
2002] The Hours
2002] Dirty Deeds
2002] About a Boy
2002] Changing Lanes
2001] Dinner with Friends (TV)
2000] The Magic Pudding (voice)
2000] Hotel Splendide
2000] Shaft
1999] The Sixth Sense
1999] 8 ½ Women
1998] Velvet Goldmine
1997] The Boys
1997] Diana & Me
1997] The James Gang
1997] Clockwatchers
1996] Emma
1996] The Pallbearer
1996] Cosi
1995] Lilian's Story
1995] Arabian Knight (voice)
1994] This Marching Girl Thing
1994] Muriel's Wedding
1992] Spotswood

LINKS

Making Her Mark
IMDB

Born 1 November 1972 Sydney, New South Wales, Australia

Toni is the oldest of three children.

Collette decided she wanted to be an actor at 15.

Married Dave Galafassi the drummer in the band Gelbison on 11 January 2003.

Nominated for a 2000 Tony Award for her performance as 'Queenie' in Michael John LaChiusa's musical "The Wild Party" on Broadway.

Won an AFi award for best actress in 1994 for "Muriel's Wedding" & a Golden Globe nomination. Toni has won 4 AFI awards including best actress for: Japanese Story (2003); Muriel's Wedding (1994) & best Supporting Actress for: The Boys (1998) & Lilian's Story (1995).

She's talked frankly about the bulimia she developed after gaining 40lbs in seven weeks for Muriel's Wedding, and about her eight months of panic attacks after she split with her boyfriend (and Velvet Goldmine co-star) Jonathan Rhys-Meyers.

Toni on Hollywoods obsession with thin women:
"What they're doing is helping create an image which is fairly unobtainable by the majority of the female population on this planet. I really don't want to help push that. There are actors who are really fantastically talented at being natural on screen and appearing to be themselves, but I like the challenge of becoming somebody else. Not everyone is completely gorgeous and I want to play people who don't normally have a voice or a presence on screen. I don't consciously choose roles in which I can make myself look really bad. I try to play real people who inspire me through something in their journey."

Toni on her role in About A Boy:
"Who wouldn't want to play Miss Granola Suicide?" Collette grins. "It sounds like the name of a fantastic album. When I got told they wanted me for the role, I was aware of the book but hadn't read it. When I read the script, I loved that it was so real. It's really funny but also really bloody sad. I felt it conveyed a realistic sense of living in urban London. People are so fearful about opening themselves up. All you want to do is to be able to connect with other people. When you connect with other people, you connect with something in yourself. It makes you feel happy. And yet it's so scary - it makes people feel vulnerable and unsafe. This film shows these bubbles being dissolved and that's quite inspirational."

Toni on acting:
"I'm pretty analytical about emotions and I think this job is good for working through that. I always had this stuff inside that I felt I needed to let out. I've always found acting satisfying because you're working internally and presenting something which is understood through action, which hopefully is beautifully told within a story on film."

Toni talks about parallels that exist between her and the role:
"With something like The Sixth Sense, doing that scene was a relief. It was towards the end of the shoot, I had been living with the knowledge of that woman's story for so long and I had experiences in my life that were similar to hers, so when we were finally shooting that scene, it was almost as if the floodgates burst open - as if I didn't have control over it because it had been lingering so long. With About a Boy, it wasn't so personal. I was playing someone who didn't want to live, which is pretty intense. It wasn't as immediately personal but it was slightly depressing."

Toni on acting:
"When I'm at work, I immerse myself in it. I don't try to live the life of my character but I think it's inevitable that there is some carry-over into your life."

Toni talking about her ups & downs:
"I'm all for getting down to the nitty-gritty and talking about it. I think it's unnatural to be happy all the time; we all go through ups and downs. In the western world, we're told to close down and shut up. Well, I think we'll implode if we don't express ourselves. I think that, for a very long time, if I hadn't had acting, I could have imploded. It was almost a case of needing to do it for a while. The first time I had a panic attack, I thought I was dying. That experience alone made me have more reverence for this life. I was 25 and was going through a lot of changes personally. I think if you don't address stuff that's going on, there's a little thing inside you that will tap you on the shoulder and tell you that you can't escape yourself."

Toni on buddism:
"I'm not Buddhist but I am drawn to it because it seems the most beneficial of organised religions, and the most compassionate."

Toni:
"I've never had a gameplan. I've never been like that. I'd rather not feel as if I have a seatbelt on. True happiness comes from living freely in the moment. Planning and worrying and chaos in your mind? Forget it. What's the point of that?"