Biography
Barbara Hershey (born Barbara Lynn Herzstein; February 5, 1948) is an American actress. In a career spanning more than 50 years, she has played a variety of roles on television and in cinema in several genres, including westerns and comedies. She began acting at age 17 in 1965 but did not achieve much critical acclaim until the latter half of the 1980s. By that time, the Chicago Tribune referred to her as "one of America's finest actresses". Hershey won an Emmy and a Golden Globe for Outstandin...
Known For
Complete Filmography

Strange Darling
2024
as Genevieve
Nothing is what it seems when a twisted one-night stand spirals into a serial killer’s vicious murder spree.

9 Bullets
2022
as Lacey
A former burlesque dancer turned author discovers a second chance at life and redemption when she risks everything to rescue her young neighbor after ...

The Manor
2021
as Judith
After suffering a stroke, Judith moves into a historic nursing home, where she begins to suspect something supernatural is preying on the residents. W...

The Happy Days of Garry Marshall
2020
as Self
In a heartfelt tribute to Hollywood legend Garry Marshall, his family and friends share their favorite memories of the creative genius behind some of ...

Insidious: The Last Key
2018
as Lorraine Lambert
Parapsychologist Elise Rainier and her team travel to Five Keys, NM, to investigate a man’s claim of a haunting. Terror soon strikes when Rainier real...

The 9th Life of Louis Drax
2016
as Violet Drax
A psychologist who begins working with a young boy who has suffered a near-fatal fall finds himself drawn into a mystery that tests the boundaries of ...

Childless
2015
as Natalie
Katherine is a typical teenager. Today's her funeral. The four adults in her life have a lot on their mind - and it's not all about Katherine either. ...

Sister
2014
as Connie
When unstable Connie is tragically widowed, she finds it impossible to care for her delinquent adolescent daughter, Niki, forcing her son, Bill, to t...

Insidious: Chapter 2
2013
as Lorraine Lambert
The haunted Lambert family seeks to uncover the mysterious childhood secret that has left them dangerously connected to the spirit world.

Left to Die
2012
as Sandra Chase
With help from U.S. Rep. Corrine Brown, Tammi Chase (Rachael Leigh Cook) fights to free her mother (Barbara Hershey) from an Ecuadorean prison.

Answers to Nothing
2011
as Marilyn
Against the backdrop of a missing girl case, lost souls throughout Los Angeles search for meaning and redemption and affect each other in ways they do...

Insidious
2011
as Lorraine Lambert
A family discovers that dark spirits have invaded their home after their son inexplicably falls into an endless sleep. When they reach out to a profes...

Black Swan
2010
as Erica Sayers / The Queen
The story of Nina, a ballerina in a New York City ballet company whose life, like all those in her profession, is completely consumed with dance. She ...

Albert Schweitzer - Anatomie eines Heiligen
2010
as Helene Schweitzer

Albert Schweitzer
2009
as Helene Schweitzer
1949 the early years of the Cold War. Albert Schweitzer has become one of the most admired men in the world. The "jungle doctor" Albert Schweitzer tel...

Anne of Green Gables: A New Beginning
2008
as Older Anne Shirley
Anne, now a middle-aged woman, is troubled by recent events in her life. When a long-hidden secret is discovered under the floorboards at Green Gables...

The Bird Can't Fly
2008
as Melody
Melody returns to her old home to Fairlands the funeral of their daughter, June to attend. But Melody not recognize their city regains because it is a...

Uncross the Stars
2008
as Hilda
The Story follows Troy, a young man whose beloved wife passes away. The movie opens at her funeral, and Troy, ill-equipped to deal with this kind of g...

Love Comes Lately
2007
as Rosalie
Though approaching his eighties, Max Kohn shows no signs of slowing down. He pursues his love life - both real and imagined - with youthful vigor, the...

The Entity Files
2005
as Self
An interview with parapsychologist Dr. Barry Taff, one of the original investigators of the Doris Bither case, the alleged haunting that inspired the...

Riding the Bullet
2004
as Jean Parker
In 1969, while studying at the University of Maine, artist Alan Parker becomes obsessed with death. Believing he is losing his girlfriend, he tries to...

Paradise
2004
as Elizabeth Paradise
Televangelist Bobby Paradise "saw God" in some space debris when he was returning to Earth as an astronaut. Or at least he was convinced he did by his...

11:14
2003
as Norma
Tells the seemingly random yet vitally connected story of a set of incidents that all converge one evening at 11:14pm. The story follows the chain of ...

The Stranger Beside Me
2003
as Ann Rule
While working at a Seattle clinic for women in the 1970s, Ann Rule becomes friends with Ted Bundy. Based on a book by Ann Rule.

Hunger Point
2003
as Marsha Hunter
A woman struggles with her self-image in a house run by a weight-obsessed mother, alongside a younger sister whose eating disorder has tragic coincide...

The Nature of Lantana
2002
as Self
The making of Lantana, a 2001 Australian drama film directed by Ray Lawrence and starring Anthony LaPaglia, Kerry Armstrong, Geoffrey Rush and Barbara...

Lantana
2001
as Valerie Somers
Plagued with grief over the murder of her daughter, Valerie Somers suspects that her husband John is cheating on her. When Valerie disappears, Detecti...

The Sinister Saga of Making The Stunt Man
2000
In 1980, The Stunt Man, starring Peter O'Toole and Steve Railsback, became one of the most acclaimed motion pictures of the decade -- an odd mixture o...

Drowning on Dry Land
1999
as Kate
A taxi driver (Naveen Andrews) picks up a fare (Barbara Hershey) in Manhattan. She offers the driver a large sum to drive her to the desert. While the...

Passion
1999
as Rose Grainger
Passion concentrates on Grainger's unusual relationship with his mother and his sexual peculiarities (especially his obsessive self-flagellation, thou...

Breakfast of Champions
1999
as Celia Hoover
A millionaire car salesman who runs the biggest dealership in Midland City, Dwayne Hoover is a celebrity, loved and trusted by everyone. Then one day,...

Outer Space
1999
as (archive footage) (uncredited)
A young woman move towards a house that holds a potentially dangerous spirit that has been tormenting her. The woman tries to fight against the film i...

A Soldier's Daughter Never Cries
1998
as Marcella Willis
This fictionalized story, based on the family life of writer James Jones, is an emotional slice-of-life story. Jones is portrayed here as Bill Willis,...

Frogs for Snakes
1998
as Eva Santana
A group of unemployed theater actors survive by working as illegal money collectors. The loan shark they are working for owns an Off-Broadway theater....

The Staircase
1998
as Mother Madalyn
A mysterious carpenter appears just as a church is in need of repair.

Portrait: Jane Campion and The Portrait of a Lady
1997
as Self
A documentary about the making of Jane Campion's 'The Portrait of a Lady'.

The Portrait of a Lady
1996
as Madame Serena Merle
Ms. Isabel Archer isn't afraid to challenge societal norms. Impressed by her free spirit, her kindhearted cousin writes her into his fatally ill fathe...

The Pallbearer
1996
as Ruth Abernathy
Aspiring architect Tom Thompson is told by mysterious Ruth Abernathy that his best friend, "Bill," has taken his own life. Except that Tom has never m...

Last of the Dogmen
1995
as Prof. Lillian Diane Sloan
A Montana bounty hunter is sent into the wilderness to track three escaped prisoners. Instead he sees something that puzzles him. Later with a female ...

Abraham
1993
as Sara
Rather than choosing a great leader or king, God chooses Abraham, an elderly shepherd from Mesopotamia, as the way to establish his Covenant with mank...

A Dangerous Woman
1993
as Frances
Martha Horgan is a withdrawn, mentally disabled woman who lives with her aunt, Frances. One of Martha's unusual traits is that she doesn't lie, a qual...

Splitting Heirs
1993
as Duchess Lucinda
A member of the English upper class dies, leaving his estate and his business to an American, whom he thinks is his son who was lost as a baby and the...

Swing Kids
1993
as Frau Müller
The story of a close-knit group of young kids in Nazi Germany who listen to banned swing music from the US. Soon dancing and fun leads to more difficu...

Falling Down
1993
as Beth
An ordinary man frustrated with the various flaws he sees in society begins to psychotically and violently lash out against them.

The Public Eye
1992
as Kay Levitz
A crime photographer gets involved in a conspiracy.

Stay the Night
1992
as Jimmie Sue Finger
Based on a true story, Barbara Hershey and Morgan Weisser portray two star crossed lovers who will stop at nothing to be together without any ridicule...

Defenseless
1991
as Thelma 'T.K.' Knudsen Katwuller
A Los Angeles lawyer defends her former college roommate, whose husband — her lover — has been slain.

Paris Trout
1991
as Hanna Trout
Paris Trout is a vile Southern bigot. He owns a store and is a loanshark. He often sues people, and so his lawyer, Harry Seagraves, eventually meets P...

Tune in Tomorrow...
1990
as Aunt Julia
Martin works at the local radio station, which just hired a new scriptwriter with a reputation for great drama, Pedro Carmichael. Martin’s aunt Julia,...

Martin Scorsese Directs
1990
as Self
Providing behind the scenes footage of the director on set with clips from his own films, Martin Scorsese Directs depicts to riveting effect the way S...

A Killing in a Small Town
1990
as Candy Morrison
The gory ax-murder of one suburban Texas housewife by another is nearly as shocking as the excuse offered by the bespectacled defendant's attorney: se...

Beaches
1988
as Hillary Whitney Essex
A privileged rich debutante and a cynical struggling entertainer share a turbulent, but strong childhood friendship over the years.

Mickey's 60th Birthday
1988
as Self
This film combines live action/original animation and library animation. Mickey steals a magic hat from a Sorcerer and is put under a spell by the ang...

A World Apart
1988
as Diana Roth
A White enclave in Johannesburg, South Africa, in the 1960s. Molly Roth, 13 years old, is the daughter of leftist parents, and she must piece together...

The Last Temptation of Christ
1988
as Mary Magdalene
Jesus, a humble Judean carpenter beginning to see that he is the son of God, is drawn into revolutionary action against the Roman occupiers by Judas -...

Shy People
1987
as Ruth
A Cosmo Magazine journalist and her daughter leave New York City to visit their distant relatives deep in the bayous of Louisiana.

Tin Men
1987
as Nora Tilley
A minor car accident drives two rival aluminum-siding salesmen to the ridiculous extremes of man versus man in 1963 Baltimore.

Passion Flower
1987
as Julia Gaitland
The movers and shakers in Singapore get involved in behind-the-scenes political and business activities, romantic entanglements, and murder. Nicol Wil...

Hoosiers
1986
as Myra Fleener
Failed college coach Norman Dale gets a chance at redemption when he is hired to coach a high school basketball team in a tiny Indiana town. After a t...

Hannah and Her Sisters
1986
as Lee
Between two Thanksgivings, Hannah's husband falls in love with her sister Lee, while her hypochondriac ex-husband rekindles his relationship with her ...

My Wicked, Wicked Ways: The Legend of Errol Flynn
1985
as Lili Damita
The life and wanton times of Errol Flynn

The Natural
1984
as Harriet Bird
An unknown middle-aged batter named Roy Hobbs with a mysterious past appears out of nowhere to take a losing 1930s baseball team to the top of the lea...

The Right Stuff
1983
as Glennis Yeager
As the Space Race ensues, seven pilots set off on a path to become the first American astronauts to enter space. However, the road to making history b...

The Nightingale
1983
as The Maid
A kitchen maid and a nightingale help save an emperor with the power of song and friendship.

The Entity
1982
as Carla Moran
Single mother Carla Moran is raped and attacked by an invisible force. She begins therapy with Dr. Phil Sneiderman, a psychiatrist who believes Carla'...

Working
1982
as Call Girl
This musical adaptation of the Studs Terkel book examines the average worker's viewpoint--showing that he or she is anything but average. Based on a s...

Americana
1981
as Jess's Daughter
In a small town in rural Kansas, a troubled veteran attempts to restore an old merry-go-round ride.

Take This Job and Shove It
1981
as Jane Margaret ("J.M.") Halstead
A junior executive is ordered to boost output in the hometown brewery where his old friends work.

The Stunt Man
1980
as Nina Franklin
A fugitive stumbles onto a movie set just when they need a new stunt man, takes the job as a way to hide out and falls for the leading lady while faci...

Angel on My Shoulder
1980
as Julie
A small-time Chicago hood, now deceased, gets a second chance at life by striking a bargain with the Devil to inhabit and attempt to corrupt a totally...

A Man Called Intrepid
1979
as Madelaine
During World War II, a wealthy Canadian uses his own money to help the Allies form an espionage network.

Sunshine Christmas
1977
as Cody Blanks
A musician, brooding over the marriage of his sometime girlfriend, decides to take his adopted daughter to his home in Texas to celebrate Christmas wi...
Just a Little Inconvenience
1977
as Nikki Klausing
Jolted out of his self-pity by a friend who teaches him to ski, a wounded Vietnam vet comes to look on his double amputation not as a "handicap" but r...

Flood!
1977
as Mary Cutler
Two helicopter pilots rush aid to a small town devastated by a flood following the collapse of an aging dam.

In the Glitter Palace
1977
as Ellen Lange
The ex-girlfriend of a lawyer, who left him for a lesbian lover, asks him to defend her lover in a murder case.

The Last Hard Men
1976
as Susan Burgade
In 1909 Arizona, retired lawman Sam Burgade's life is thrown upside-down when his old enemy Provo and six other convicts escape a chain-gang in the Yu...

Trial by Combat
1976
as Marion Evans
A group called The Knights Of Avalon are unhappy with the justice system so are taking the law into their own hands by executing criminals using medie...

Diamonds
1975
as Sally
Charles Hodgson is a British aristocrat who decides to become a thief as a way of getting at his twin brother, Earl, a security expert who has built a...

You and Me
1975
as Waitress
A young boy and a biker become friends on the road.

The Crazy World of Julius Vrooder
1974
as Zanni (as Barbara Seagull)
After returning home from the war, Vietnam veteran Julius Vrooder resides in a veteran's hospital, where he has been vaguely diagnosed as "psychiatric...

Love Comes Quietly
1973
as Angela
Love Comes Quietly (aka Angela) tells the story of a free-spirited girl who was born in the wrong place at the wrong time. In the 1920s, even the some...

Boxcar Bertha
1972
as Boxcar Bertha
"Boxcar" Bertha Thompson, a transient woman in Arkansas during the violence-filled Depression of the early '30s, meets up with rabble-rousing union ma...

Dealing: Or the Berkeley-to-Boston Forty-Brick Lost-Bag Blues
1972
as Susan
A Harvard graduate transports a load of marijuana from Boston to Berkeley, California.

The Pursuit of Happiness
1971
as Jane Kauffman
William Popper is the son of a stockbroker and is thoroughly disenchanted with "the system." So much so that even though he can prove that he ran over...

The Baby Maker
1970
as Tish Gray
Tish Gray had a baby and gave it up for adoption. She is contacted by a second childless couple who want her to have the husband's baby because of the...

The Liberation of L.B. Jones
1970
as Nella Mundine
A successful African American businessman has a quarrel with a white policeman, suspecting that he is having an affair with his wife. The policeman's ...

Last Summer
1969
as Sandy
During summer vacation on Fire Island, three young people become very close. When an uncool girl tries to infiltrate the trio's newly found relationsh...

Heaven with a Gun
1969
as Leloopa
Jim Killian arrives in a small Arizona town hoping to establish a peaceful life as the local preacher, but he soon finds himself in the middle of a fe...

With Six You Get Eggroll
1968
as Stacy Iverson
Abby McClure, a widow with three sons, and Jake Iverson, a widower with a teenage daughter, begin dating and eventually decide to get married. But the...

Eugene the Marine
N/A
as Frances
A former marine fights to keep his life from unraveling as his son tries to force him out of his longtime family home and a series of gruesome murders...

The Natural: The Best There Ever Was
N/A
as Self
An average baseball film in the making comes out of seemingly nowhere to become one of the best sports films made of all time. A true testament to the...