Amy Lou Adams (born August 20, 1974) is an American actress. Known for both her comedic and dramatic roles, she has been featured three times in annual rankings of the world's highest-paid actresses. She has received various accolades including two Golden Globes, and has been nominated for six Academy Awards, seven British Academy Film Awards, and two Primetime Emmy Awards. Adams began her career as a dancer in a dinner theater, which she pursued from 1994 to 1998, and made her film debut with a supporting part in the dark comedy Drop Dead Gorgeous (1999). She made guest appearances on television and took "mean girl" parts in low-budget feature films. Her first major role was in Steven Spielberg's biopic Catch Me If You Can (2002), but she was unemployed for a year afterward. Her breakthrough came when she played a loquacious pregnant woman in the independent comedy-drama Junebug (2005), for which she received her first Academy Award nomination. The musical fantasy film Enchanted (2007), in which Adams played cheerful princess-to-be Giselle, was her first success in a leading role. She followed it by playing other naïve, optimistic women in films like the drama Doubt (2008) and Sunshine Cleaning (2008) and subsequently played more assertive parts to positive reviews in the sports film The Fighter (2010) and the psychological drama The Master (2012). From 2013 to 2017, she portrayed Lois Lane in superhero films set in the DC Extended Universe. She won two consecutive Golden Globes for Best Actress for playing a seductive con artist in the crime film American Hustle (2013) and painter Margaret Keane in the biopic Big Eyes (2014). Further acclaim came for playing a linguist in the science fiction film Arrival (2016), a self-harming reporter in the HBO miniseries Sharp Objects (2018), and Lynne Cheney in the satire Vice (2018). On stage, Adams starred in a Public Theater revival of Into the Woods in 2012 and a West End revival of The Glass Menagerie in 2022. In 2014, she was named one of the 100 most influential people in the world by Time, and featured in the Forbes Celebrity 100 list.