Arquette, Rosanna (1959– )

US film and television actor. An accomplished dramatic and comic performer, she has displayed a preference for offbeat, quirky roles, carving out a niche for herself as an independent film specialist. It was her role in Desperately Seeking Susan (1985) that launched Arquette to international stardom. In 1996 she appeared in David Cronenberg's controversial film Crash.

Arquette broke into the film business as a teenager, appearing in a string of television films. Her performances as a deaf-mute in Johnny Belinda (1982) and as a bitchy college student in John Sayles's Baby, It's You (1983) helped cement her reputation. The latter was the first of many film roles in which she portrayed a manipulative blonde siren, a character type developed in Martin Scorsese's After Hours (1985) and ‘Life Lessons’, his segment of the film New York Stories (1989), in which she plays an artist's unwilling muse.

Among her many other films are After Hours (1985), Silverado (1985), Nobody's Fool (1986), Le Grand Bleu/The Big Blue (1988), Pulp Fiction (1994), Buffalo '66 (1998), and The Whole Nine Yards (2000).

Rosanna is a member of the Arquette acting dynasty, which includes grandfather Cliff, father Lewis, sister Patricia, and brothers David, Alexis, and Richmond.