21 Oscar Noms · 3 Wins · 47 Years on Screen · The Standard
Born June 22, 1949 · Summit, New Jersey
She has been nominated for more Academy Awards than any human being in history. Twenty-one times. She has played a Holocaust survivor, a fashion magazine editor, a British Prime Minister, and a violin teacher from the Bronx — and each time, people forgot they were watching Meryl Streep. That's not a career. That's a magic trick sustained for five decades.
Six acts. Five decades. The woman who made becoming someone else look effortless, because she made everything look effortless.
A blonde cheerleader who secretly devoured literature, then walked into Yale and outperformed everyone.
Mary Louise Streep grew up in Summit, New Jersey, the daughter of a pharmaceutical executive and a commercial artist. She was homecoming queen. She sang opera by 12. She studied at Vassar, then the Yale School of Drama, where she performed in over forty productions in three years. Her Yale teachers said she had a photographic memory for accents and could master a dialect in hours. She moved to New York in 1975 and within two years was on Broadway, in Joseph Papp's Shakespeare in the Park, and dating the actor John Cazale — Fredo from The Godfather. Then Cazale was diagnosed with terminal bone cancer, and everything changed.
Three films. Two Oscars. A level of talent so obvious it was undeniable from the very first frame.
The Deer Hunter (1978) earned her first Oscar nomination — a supporting role where she had to fight for her own lines (the script gave her almost nothing; she improvised). Kramer vs. Kramer (1979) with Dustin Hoffman won her the Supporting Actress Oscar. Then came Sophie's Choice (1982), where she played a Polish Holocaust survivor and delivered what many consider the greatest single performance in the history of cinema. Her Polish accent was so perfect that native speakers assumed she was Polish. She won Best Actress. She was 33 years old with two Oscars and the title she'd carry for the rest of her life: the greatest actress of her generation.
She could become anyone. Danish, Australian, Italian, Irish — the accent was always the entry point into the soul.
Out of Africa (1985) as Karen Blixen with a Danish accent. A Cry in the Dark (1988) as Lindy Chamberlain with an Australian accent — "A dingo ate my baby" became a punchline, but the performance underneath is devastating. Postcards from the Edge (1990), a thinly-veiled Carrie Fisher autobiography. The Bridges of Madison County (1995) opposite Clint Eastwood, playing an Italian war bride in Iowa. She was nominated eight more times during this stretch. She won zero additional Oscars. The narrative shifted: Streep was the perennial nominee, brilliant but perhaps too technical, too controlled.
At an age when Hollywood discards women, she became the biggest female movie star on the planet. Again.
The Devil Wears Prada (2006) reinvented Streep for a new generation. Miranda Priestly — icy, devastating, hilarious — made $326M worldwide and proved that a 57-year-old woman could open a blockbuster. Doubt (2008) earned her fifteenth Oscar nomination. Julie & Julia made her a commercial draw again. Then The Iron Lady (2011) as Margaret Thatcher gave her a third Oscar — seventeen years after her last win. She was 62 and had just proven that talent, unlike youth, doesn't expire.
She stopped being an actress and became a force of nature. Every film was an event. Every speech was a movement.
August: Osage County, Into the Woods, Florence Foster Jenkins, The Post with Tom Hanks and Steven Spielberg. Little Women with Greta Gerwig. Big Little Lies on HBO, proving she could dominate television too. Her 2017 Golden Globes speech, where she called out political figures without naming them, became the most-watched awards speech in a decade. She was no longer just an actress. She was a moral authority.
At 75, she joined a Hulu comedy and reminded everyone she was also the funniest person in any room.
Don't Look Up with Leonardo DiCaprio. Only Murders in the Building alongside Steve Martin and Martin Short — a comedic role that delighted a generation discovering her for the first time. In 2024, she and Don Gummer quietly announced they had been separated since 2017, after 45 years together. She continues to work, continues to choose unexpected roles, and continues to shatter the notion that great actresses have an expiration date. Twenty-one Oscar nominations. Three wins. Seventy-five years old. Not done.
Directors, co-stars, and the people who orbited the most decorated career in cinema history.
The case for. The case against. Her place in the pantheon, argued by the community.
First-person accounts, film analysis, fact-checks, and scene pitches from 298 contributors.
She became everyone. Help tell the story of the woman underneath.