The bestJuliette Lewismovies and TV shows started when she was a teenager, appearing inNational Lampoon’sChristmas Vacationand Martin Scorsese’s remake ofCape Fear. A second-generation performer, her father was the well-known character actor Geoffrey Lewis, and she made her debut as a child actor in the 1986 movieMy Stepmother Is an Alien. That film led to a television role inI Married Dora,and then to her breakout inChristmas Vacation,with futureBig Bang Theoryactor Johnny Galecki playing her brother.
Lewis’s career skyrocketed from there thanks to her quirky personality and distinctive dialect. She caught Martin Scorsese’s eye when he cast her in his1991 remake of the psychological thrillerCape Fear,and she went on to earn roles in movies directed by acclaimed filmmakers like Woody Allen, Lasse Hallström, Oliver Stone, Nora Ephron, and Kathryn Bigelow. Most recently, Lewis has earned a new audience thanks to hertelevision work in the Showtime seriesYellowjackets.
Released in 2015,Jem and the Hologramswas a surprising movie. It was a box office failure when released, earning only $2.3 million on a $5 million budget, but received mixed reviews and gained a bigger audience years later thanks to streaming.The film is based on the 1980s animated TV seriesJem and the Hologramsand stars Aubrey Peeples as Jem, the lead singer of the titular band. Directed by John M. Chu (Crazy Rich Asians), the film focuses on the struggles of maintaining a band while powerful forces try to tear them apart.
Juliette Lewis plays Erica Raymond, a character based on the male Eric Raymond from the original cartoon. She is the main villain of the series, an unscrupulous record producer who pretends to be Jem’s friend and ally but has been scheming against her the entire movie. While the film was criticized when it was released, it gained fans when it became available on streaming, with many recognizing the satire and humor, as well as the solid performances by the main cast.
Future Oscar-winning director Kathryn Bigelow has a notable filmography. In 2010, she became the first woman to win Best Director at the Academy Awards forThe Hurt Locker,and she has two Best Picture nominations forThe Hurt LockerandZero Dark Thirty. However, she also has solid genre fare in her past, including the vampire movieNear Darkand the sci-fi thrillerStrange Days. That latter movie was released in 1995 andfocused on the fears of the new millennium, set on New Year’s Eve 1999.
Los Angeles is a war zone at the end of 1999, and people live in fear while criminals rule the city. Ralph Fiennes is Lenny, a man who is in love with Juliette Lewis’s Faith, and he sets out to save her alongside a woman named Mace (Angela Bassett), who loves him.Strange Daysis a sci-fi thriller with deep-seated mysteries and futuristic, dystopian tech in a story by James Cameron. While a box office failure, critics praised the film for its acting and technical marvels, and it has only gained praise over the years since its release.
Released in 2025,Opusis athriller movie about a cult and a man who convinces people to follow himdespite all the warning signs. John Malkovich appears as Alfred Moretti, a 1990s pop star who comes out of retirement with the announcement of a new album. To promote the release, he invites six guests to a listening party at his Utah compound. However, when the guests arrive to hear the album, a journalist named Ariel (Ayo Edebiri) realizes that Alfred lives with a cult called the Levelists, and they follow his commands.
Juliette Lewis stars as talk show host Clara Armstrong, one of Alfred’s guests. When the guests learn too late that Moretti has invited them there to kill them, Ariel and Clara must find a way to survive until the end. The film received mixed reviews, with critics praising John Malkovich’s performance, but the main complaints centered on what was described as a confusing concept.
In 2023, Juliette Lewis joined the cast of the Boots Riley miniseriesI’m a Virgo. In his follow-up to the critically acclaimedSorry to Bother You, this Prime Video miniseries is an absurdist comedy about a 13-foot-tall, 19-year-old young man named Cootie (Jharrel Jerome), whose aunt shelters him from the world until a group of teenage political activists discover him.Juliette Lewis stars as the voice of Justin,a character whoappears in the fictional show-within-a-showParking Tickets.
Critics also praised the cast, calling them “eclectic,” delivering performances unlike anything else on television.
The series received high critical acclaim, with a 96% “fresh” Rotten Tomatoes score. Reviews praised the satire, humor, and heart of Riley’s story. Critics also praised the cast, calling them “eclectic,” delivering performances unlike anything else on television. While this isn’t a significant part for Lewis, since it’s a voice role and she’s never seen, she does appear in four of the seven episodes of a series that received almost universal acclaim. TheParkingTicketsfictional series serves as the backbone of that story.
In 1994, Oliver Stone castWoody Harrelson and Juliette Lewis as Mickey and Mallory Knox, a pair of serial killers who blaze a trail of death across the Midwest. Based on the story by Quentin Tarantino, although he has since disowned it, Oliver Stone created a critique of how the national media turns serial killers into media sensations and how the public romanticizes these people. However, much criticism went towards Stone, who made these killers sympathetic, especially to Lewis’s Mallory Knox.
Despite this,Natural Born Killerswas a huge success, making $110 million on a $34 million budget. The film received mixed reviews, with most criticism focusing on the over-the-top violence. However, praise went to the cast, humor, and soundtrack, which was one of Trent Reznor’s earliest movie-scoring efforts. The film was included on several critics' top 10 best-of lists, as well as many other worst-movie lists.
While Quentin Tarantino dislikedNatural Born Killers, his anger was directed at Oliver Stone, not the movie’s cast. Two years later, Juliette Lewis joined the cast ofFrom Dusk Till Dawn, directed by Robert Rodriguez, based on Quentin Tarantino’s script. In this film, Tarantino and George Clooney star as the Gecko brothers, two thieves who are on the run after killing a man in a liquor store robbery.The brothers head to Mexico and take a family hostageon the way there.
Lewis was even nominated for a Saturn Award for Best Supporting Actress.
Harvey Keitel is a pastor who is vacationing with his teenage kids, Scott (Ernest Liu) and Kate (Juliette Lewis), and they end up as the Gecko brothers' hostages. Lewis has a significant role in the film, fighting the vampires alongside her family and abductors, and is one of the only survivors of the night at the vampire bar. The film received mixed to positive reviews, and Lewis was even nominated for a Saturn Award for Best Supporting Actress.
In 1993, Lasse Hallström directed the coming-of-age drama filmWhat’s Eating Gilbert Grape. The story follows a grocery store clerk named Gilbert Grape (Johnny Depp), who lives with his dysfunctional family, which includes his obese mother (Darlene Cates), his disabled younger brother (Leonardo DiCaprio), and his two sisters. Soon,a young woman named Becky, played by Juliette Lewis, ends up stranded in the townwith her grandmother, and she develops a relationship with Gilbert.
The film is challenging to watch, with Gilbert taking responsibility for his mother and brother while realizing there might be no way for him to escape this town and the life he’s in. This is especially hard when he meets Becky, who represents the freedom and escape that Gilbert so desperately needs. The film didn’t achieve much success when it was released but became more successful on home video. Critics praised the story and the actors, awarding it a 90% “fresh” rating on Rotten Tomatoes.
One constant of theVacationmovie series was the recasting of the Griswold children in each movie. In the third film, it happened again, withJuliette Lewis taking on the role of Audrey Griswold(previously played by Dana Barron and Dana Hill) and Johnny Galecki playing Rusty (previously played by Anthony Michael Hall and Jason Lively). What resulted was the most beloved movie in the franchise and a film that has become a Christmas classic, still re-watched decades later.
The film features Clark Griswold trying to ensure that his home has the best Christmas decorations in the neighborhood to impress his visiting parents while also dreaming of the pool he put a down payment on, expecting a Christmas bonus that never arrives. While it only has a 72% critics' score on Rotten Tomatoes, it has an 86% audience score, and it has received more positive reviews in the years since its release than it did initially in theaters.
Yellowjacketsis a Showtime series that flips between two different timelines. The first is a timeline involving a high school soccer team that gets stranded in Canada after a plane crash and remains there for 19 months. While stranded, they develop aLord of the Fliesmentality, and some resort to cannibalism. The second timeline is present-day, wherethe survivors reunite 25 years after the accident,and the trauma continues when they realize they haven’t all reconciled their past secrets.
Juliette Lewis stars as the adult version of Nat Scatorccio (played by Sophie Thatcher in the flashbacks). She still struggles with addiction issues that she had in high school before the accident and lives a self-destructive lifestyle as an adult.Yellowjacketshas had three seasons, comprising 29 episodes, and has received critical acclaim, with a 100% rating for its first season and a 94% rating for its second. Lewis received two Hollywood Critics Association Awards nominations for Best Actress.
In 1991, Martin Scorseseremade the 1962 filmCape Fear. The original movie starred Gregory Peck and Robert Mitchum as an attorney and a former client who seeks revenge for his prison sentence for rape. Scorsese recast the roles with Nick Nolte and the attorney, Samuel Bowden, and Robert De Niro as Max Cady, who was found guilty of raping a 16-year-old girl.Scorsese cast teenage Juliette Lewis as Danielle, Samuel’s daughterand the target Max chose to hurt Samuel the most.
The film picked up two Oscar nominations, one for Robert De Niro for Best Actor and one for Lewis for Best Supporting Actress.
While only 18 whenCape Fearwas released, it earnedJuliette Lewisthe most critical acclaim she would achieve in her career. The film picked up two Oscar nominations, one for Robert De Niro for Best Actor and one for Lewis for Best Supporting Actress. The two actors also received Golden Globe nominations for their performances. This was the only movie that earned Lewis any nominations at those two prestigious awards ceremonies.
