by Beth Pinsker, Senior Producer (see more from this contributor)

Joan Allen knows how to play pissed-off women ‑- tight-as-a-drum, wickedly perfect, manipulated and manipulative women, the kind who get caught up in the expectations of their times and fight subversively against the powers that be. Like Pat Nixon. Like the uptight moms in The Ice Storm and Pleasantville. Like Elizabeth Proctor in The Crucible. This kind of work has earned her three Oscar nominations and won her a Tony on Broadway. All the while, behind the scenes, she's as nice as can be.

  • Watch the video!

    See Joan Allen in action at the Sundance Film Festival, where The Upside of Anger had its world premiere. How different is Joan? Listen as she describes her character's psychosis after her husband leaves her, and see how her high-strung (and physically fit) character lashes out at cheating men in a very unusual way!

"I certainly do get at the end of my rope at times," Allen says. "We all do." But she is happily married with an 11-year-old daughter and enjoys life out of the spotlight in New York. She only braves the Hollywood scene when her daughter wants to see something like Robots and she takes her to the premiere, along with other doting parents like Ethan Hawke and Spike Lee. She goes home often to the small town she grew up in, Rochelle, Illinois, and sponsors a scholarship for a high school senior who wants to study the arts.

For a respected actress with her kind of track record, she doesn't need much of a second wind. But the 48-year-old Allen is having something of a mid-career stretch. She has worked on five movies in the last few years, and has two of them being released on March 11 ‑- The Upside of Anger, which promises to be one of the top romantic comedies of the season, and Off the Map, Campbell Scott's directorial debut, which has been sitting on a shelf for the past three years. In June, Allen will star in Yes, a lyrical and experimental love story by director Sally Potter. And Allen's currently working on producing her first movie, Pushers Needed, which she'll also star in along with Brenda Blethyn, Maggie Smith, Kathy Bates and Claire Danes.

"You never can predict that stuff. It comes, it goes, you never know," she says.

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