Where have we seen Jennifer Coolidge before?

Jenaissance. That's what Vogue called Jennifer Coolidge's renaissance. Thanks to the success of The Watcher and, above all, The White Lotus, the American actress is experiencing a golden moment, acclaimed by critics and audiences alike, but, until a couple of years ago, most people had difficulty associating her face with a name. It happens often and to so many talented performers, mostly character actors, that we see in the cinema or on TV. For a long time Coolidge was simply Stifler's mum in the American Pie saga, the blonde, buxom, swaddled in tight-fitting dresses, the goddess all teenagers would want to have sex with. Since 1999 (the year the first film was released), in the collective imagination Jennifer has remained the most famous milf ever, along with Mrs Robinson from The Graduate. 

A difficult career

Role after role, she has crystallized into the bimbo with a Junoesque physique, blond hair and a myopic Marilyn gaze, the comic sidekick for whom few jokes were reserved. Yet there was always something more about her. A mixture of awkwardness and attractiveness, comedy and melancholy that made her loved by those who grew up with the comedies of the early 2000s and who still remember her today with a kind of family affection, the same as the eccentric and always a little over the top aunt, the manicurist Paulette Bonafonté in Legally Blonde, Hilary Duff's stepmother in A Cinderella Story or the Sophie in the series 2 Broke Girls. Jennifer thought it would end like this. As one of those actresses whose name nobody remembers, one of those who once played characters good only as an inspiration for Halloween costumes, a living meme. The engagements had begun to thin out, she had begun to fade. Then the pandemic, depression and a period of unbearable immobility from which she believed she would never recover. She herself confessed to Variety: "For a few years in my life not much happened. I went through a dead time. I think I spent ten years auditioning, noticing how none of them ever turned into work. If I couldn't get important roles, I came to the conclusion that people thought I was incapable of doing them and convinced myself of that."

Jennifer Coolidge's return

The first inkling that her destiny was about to change came out of the blue in 2018, when Ariana Grande, a huge fan of hers, imitated her on Jimmy Fallon and then wanted her in his Thank U, Next video. Coolidge was back on the radar of the public and those who, like Gen Z, were discovering her perhaps for the first time, but also of Hollywood. The really important call, the one she had perhaps been waiting for, came from Mike White who offered her the role of Tanya McQuoid in The White Lotus. Rich, emotional, voracious, self-centred, fragile, restless, Coolidge is poignant and perfect as the lonely heiress with a childhood scarred by her absent mother. Wonderfully tragic in her flamboyant haute couture outfits and headscarves that echo a Dolce Vita aesthetic that perhaps never really existed. Less Monica Vitti, more Peppa Pig. And that's OK, because for this performance the American actress won her first Emmy. Success came. The critics began to applaud her, the public to rediscover her filmography and the phone to ring again. So Jennifer was offered the character of Karen in The Watcher, the estate agent who flaunts her suits and Chanel handbags as she flaunts her false friendship. Beneath a mask of smiles and designer clothes she hides a great desire for revenge and a good dose of careerism and greed that will ultimately backfire on her. We also saw Jennifer on Amazon Prime in the comedy Shotgun Wedding with Jennifer Lopez and Josh Duhamel. The actress enjoys her 15 minutes of second success, aware of her transience. But, this time, also that no one will ever forget her again.