Lori Singer - Cast Member of the Month

Lori Singer

Lori Singer was born Lori Jacqueline Singer on 6^th November 1957 making her star sign Scorpio. Scorpion’s have been described as honest, loyal and knowing what they want out of life and not being afraid to work hard and play the long game to get it.

Lori was born in Corpus Christi, Texas, the daughter of conductor Jacques Singer and Leslie Singer (née Wright), a concert pianist. When Lori was four years old, she relocated with her family and as raised in Portland, Oregon, where her father served as lead conductor of the Portland Symphony Orchestra from 1962 to 1972.

Lori has a twin Brother Gregory and two older brothers Marc, and Claude. Marc is also an actor and best known for his role on the TV miniseries V.

A musical prodigy Lori made her debut as a cellist with the Oregon Symphony at thirteen, and She attended Lincoln High School in Portland.   In the summer of 1971, Lori and Gregory attended a summer music camp in New York led by famed cellist Yo-Yo Ma and Lori was subsequently accepted to  the Juilliard School in New York City, at age fourteen, where she became the youngest graduate of the institution. After graduating from Juilliard, She performed with the Western Washington University Symphony Orchestra and won the Bergen Philharmonic Competition.

In the early 1980s, Lori signed with Elite Model Management and appeared in top fashion magazines like Vogue, before shifting her focus to acting. She also married Richard Emery in 1980.

Inspired by her Brother Marc Singer's success in Hollywood, Lori had started taking acting lessons at age 17. Success came pretty much straight away when in 1980 Lori was cast as cellist Julie Miller for the pilot of the television series Fame, in which she appeared in at total of 36 episodes in the first and second seasons. She also starred in the 1982 TV Movie “Born Beautiful” and won a Silver Halo Award for her performance.

Lori also toured with the Fame cast in the U.K. in 1982 and 1983. Whilst on tour in the U.K. Lori learnt that she’d got the lead role of Ariel Moore in the musical film Footloose; beating out Madonna for the part. As Fame had been cancelled by NBC in America contracts were up for renewal for the third season and Lori decided not to resign and quit the tour to fly back to America to start work on the film, which was a huge success when it was released in 1984.

Lori carved out a quite a career in movies with parts in John Schlesinger's drama “The Falcon and the Snowman”, the comedy “The Man with One Red Shoe”, the horror film “Warlock”.  In 1985, Lori was nominated for the Independent Spirit Award for Best Female Lead in Trouble in Mind. She also appeared in Robert Altman’s ensemble drama “Short Cuts” in 1993, for which she won a Golden Globe Award for her outstanding performance.

In her personal life, Lori had a son, Jacques Rio, in 1991 and divorced her husband Richard in 1998. In 1993, Lori performance in Short Cuts (1993).

In 1995, Lori starred in VR.5 (1995) the short-lived sci-fi series. That same year, she was also listed in People magazine as one of the "Most Beautiful People". After the series ended in 1997 

Lori took some time to bring up her son, living in Manhattan.

Lori still plays the cello regularly, and continues to act in various projects. She also devotes a lot of time to fundraising for various charities.