Helen Shaver

A cool blonde beauty who played several effective lead and character roles in the 1980s, Shaver was outstanding as a prim East Coast college professor who makes a wary, but liberating foray into lesbianism in Donna Deitch's moving "Desert Hearts" (1985). She was certainly seen by a wider audience opposite Paul Newman in "The Color of Money" (1986). Shaver exudes enthusiasm in every role. She made her film debut in "Shoot" in 1976, but made a greater impact as the wife in the poltergeist-infested home in "The Amityville Horror" (1979), at the time the highest grossing independent film in history. She is also remembered as the woman "cured" by philandering Tom Berrenger in "In Praise of Older Women" (1978), the Protestant missionary in "Dr. Bethune" (1993) and as the mother of a teenage witch (Fairuza Balk) in "The Craft" (1996).

Helen Shaver Biography

Shaver began her career as a theater actress in her native Canada, but since she began the US phase of her career, she has made infrequent stage appearances. Her work in "Ghost on Fire" at the La Jolla Playhouse was much applauded and she made her Broadway debut in Neil Simon's "Jake's Women", opposite Alan Alda. As Maggie, Jake's humorless second wife, Shaver earned a Theater World Award.