Born 10/29/1967
An auburn-haired player of film and TV, this offspring of Hollywood songbirds Eddie Fisher and Connie Stevens began her showbiz career at age 12 when she joined her mother on stage for a couple of songs. Joely Fisher joined with her mother and veteran comic Bob Hope to entertain the troops during the Persian Gulf War and made her TV debut in "Bob Hope's USO Christmas From the Persian Gulf--Around the World in Eight Days" (NBC, 1988). Several years later, Fisher segued to episodic TV with a two-parter on the ABC family sitcom "Growing Pains". After additional guest spots on sitcoms like "Blossom" and "The Golden Palace", she was cast as a regular in the comedy "Ellen" (ABC, 1994-98). As the somewhat self-centered Paige Clark, Ellen's best friend, Fisher provided a stronger female persona than was in the show's first incarnation "These Friends of Mine" (ABC, 1993). When Ellen disclosed her homosexuality in a ground-breaking 1997 episode, it allowed Fisher's character to develop further as Paige struggled with her feelings to comic effect.
The same year she landed her series role, Fisher entered features. In James L Brooks' ill-fated would-be musical "I'll Do Anything", she was a Hollywood development executive and sparring partner of Albert Brooks. Additionally, she had small roles in Nora Ephron's "Mixed Nuts" and "The Mask" (both 1994). Fisher made her Broadway debut in 1995 as one of the many "name" guests playing bad girl Rizzo in the revival of "Grease".
