racey
Ullman was born on December 30th 1959 in Slough of county Berkshire, west of London, England near Windsor Castle. Her father died when she was
6. She entered the Italia Conti Stage School at a young age and by 16 had
a ballet contract in Berlin. She made her debut there in "Gigi."
Returning to London, Tracey started performing in musical productions.
She was a backup singer with Shakin' Stevens in "ELVIS,
THE MUSICAL," played Frenchy in "GREASE" and even played
Janet in "THE ROCKY HORROR PICTURE SHOW."
n
1981, she won the London Theatre Critics Award for her role as Beverly,
the club singer in "Four In A Million." Originally planned as
a solo dramatic performance, "Four In A Million" developed into
a comedic piece which led to a successful stint in the sketch comedy show
"A KICK UP THE EIGHTIES" (along with Rik Mayall). Tracey followed
this with the satirical BBC comedy series, "THREE OF A KIND,"
which paired her with another formidable Britcomedy talent, Lenny Henry.
This earned her a British Academy Award for Best Light Entertainment Performance
in 1983. Not content to be just a dancer or actress, Tracey became a true
triple threat when she hit the British pop music scene in 1984 with a smash
debut album called
YOU BROKE MY HEART IN 17 PLACES which spawned
the international Top Ten hit "They Don't Know." She snagged
Paul McCartney to appear in the video only to return the favour by playing
a supporting role in Macca's film "GIVE MY REGARDS TO BROAD STREET".
This was followed by a brilliant TV film, "THE YOUNG VISITERS"
(that's how it's spelled as it was written by a nine-year-old girl called
Daisy Ashford during the Edwardian era.) After completing two more albums,
"YOU CAUGHT ME OUT" in 1984, and "FOREVER" in 1985,
Tracey decided to concentrate on her true passion, acting.
n
1985 Tracey starred with Meryl
Streep and Sting in
Plenty
and then appeared in 6 episodes
of the sitcom,
"GIRLS ON TOP"
with French and Saunders, playing the role of a thieving, lying bimbo named Candy.
After an inspired cameo in "JUMPIN' JACK FLASH", Tracey snagged
a production deal with CBS television and actually filmed a pilot for a
TV series. She considered the pilot "mush" and dropped the deal.
Soon thereafter, she caught the eye of James L. Brooks of "Terms Of
Endearment", "Rhoda" and "Taxi" fame who developed
a deal with the brand spanking new FOX TV for Tracey to create her own
variety show in 1987. "THE TRACEY ULLMAN SHOW" would eventually
give viewers four inspired years of historic television comedy and garner
Tracey 3 Emmys, (two for "Outstanding Performance and one for "Outstanding
Writing") and a Golden Globe in 1988. It also launched "THE
SIMPSONS" and co-starred Dan
Castellaneta, Sam
McMurray, Joseph Malone and Julie
Kavner.
racey
continued her eclectic choice of movie roles by starring as the wife who
desperately plots to kill her adulterer husband with a pot of drugged spaghetti
in the black comedy,
I LOVE YOU TO DEATH
Following the FOX series in the summer of 1990, Tracey played Kate to Morgan Freeman's
Petruchio in "THE TAMING OF THE SHREW" in New York's Central
Park. Since she was in the general vicinity, she decided to take Broadway
by storm in 1991 by starring in her own one woman show, "THE
BIG LOVE." After giving birth to a son, Tracey focused on film
with roles in
HOUSEHOLD SAINTS
READY TO WEAR(PRET-A-PORTER)
ROBIN HOOD: MEN IN TIGHTS
I'LL DO ANYTHING
and
BULLETS OVER BROADWAY. She
also appeared in an unbilled cameo as Meryl
Streep's maid in DEATH BECOMES HER.
n
1993, after winning her 4th Emmy for a guest appearance on "Love And
War", as an Israeli Ballerina, Tracey grabbed her fifth Emmy for the
cable special "TRACEY TAKES ON NEW YORK". She also became the
speaking voice of LITTLE
LULU in the Saturday morning animated series. She also appeared in
the British ITV production, "A CLASS ACT" and was the lead voice
in the children's film, "HAPPILY EVER AFTER". She returned to
regular television in 1995 with a series of CableAce and Emmy Award winning
HBO TV specials entitled TRACEY
TAKES ON... and has recently completed a third season. In September
1997, Tracey received her 6th Emmy for Best Variety Show Musical/Comedy
for TRACEY TAKES ON...,
a feat only surpassed by Ed Asner, Dinah Shore and Mary Tyler Moore. Another
milestone was made in Tracey's career when she became an author in January
1998 with the release of "TRACEY TAKES ON...THE BOOK" . Considered
a companion piece to the TV series, TRACEY
TAKES ON...THE BOOK provided readers with an insight into Tracey's
earlier years and a more detailed look at some of her most prolific characters.
Tracey also released two video sets:
Tracey Takes On...Sex Romance Fantasy and
Tracey Takes On...Movies Vanity Fame
the same year. 1999 brought Tracey into the world of online fashion to great success with the launch of her own clothing site
Purpleskirt.com and a 7th Emmy winning performance for a guest appearance on ALLY McBEAL. In 2000, Tracey returned to the big screen to great acclaim as Frenchy Winkler in Woody Allen's SMALL TIME CROOKS and
in an uncharacteristically straight role as Martha, the wife of a "hit-man" in the highly acclaimed independent feature,
PANIC. In the fall of 2001, Tracey brought her humor to a fashion talk show entitled Visible Panty Lines on the Oxygen Network.
2004 marked another appearance for Tracey in an auteur filmmaker's film. In her bawdiest performance yet, Tracey plays sex addict, Sylvia Stickles in John Waters' A DIRTY SHAME. 2005 beckons us with Tracey's return to musical form in the lead role of Princess Winnifred in ABC TV's ONCE UPON A MATTRESS.
She now resides in LA and has a second home in England. Tracey is married
to Allan McKeown, a producer (THE NEW STATESMAN, LOVEJOY, BIRDS OF A
FEATHER, JERRY SPRINGER: THE MUSICAL) and has two children, Mabel and John. She's also one of the few
people on American soil who still pops popcorn in a skillet! Suburban she
is not, and for that, we should all be glad.
racey
Ullman was born on December 30th 1959 in Slough of county Berkshire, west of London, England near Windsor Castle. Her father died when she was
6. She entered the Italia Conti Stage School at a young age and by 16 had
a ballet contract in Berlin. She made her debut there in "Gigi."
Returning to London, Tracey started performing in musical productions.
She was a backup singer with Shakin' Stevens in "
n
1981, she won the London Theatre Critics Award for her role as Beverly,
the club singer in "Four In A Million." Originally planned as
a solo dramatic performance, "Four In A Million" developed into
a comedic piece which led to a successful stint in the sketch comedy show
"A KICK UP THE EIGHTIES" (along with Rik Mayall). Tracey followed
this with the satirical BBC comedy series, "THREE OF A KIND,"
which paired her with another formidable Britcomedy talent, Lenny Henry.
This earned her a British Academy Award for Best Light Entertainment Performance
in 1983. Not content to be just a dancer or actress, Tracey became a true
triple threat when she hit the British pop music scene in 1984 with a smash
debut album called 
