And The Name Is Cherry Jones (no relation)!

You probably remember her from Steven Soderbergh films like "Erin Brockovich", "Ocean's 12" or Tim Robbins' "Cradle Will Rock"...
...but did you know she's one of the great American stage actresses...
... appearing in the lead roles of a revival of "The Heiress", "Faith Healer", and John Patrick Shanley's "Doubt"?

Well, she is. And she has.

But enough of my yakkin'. Howsabout we hear what those big-time pathological liars at Wikipedia have to say...

Career
Jones is known primarily for her stage work, including her Tony-winning lead performances in Lincoln Center's 1995 production of The Heiress and John Patrick Shanley's play Doubt, which opened at the Walter Kerr Theatre in March 2005. Other Broadway credits include Nora Ephron's play Imaginary Friends (with Swoosie Kurtz); Angels in America: Millennium Approaches and Perestroika, the 2000 revival of A Moon for the Misbegotten, and Timberlake Wertenbaker's Our Country's Good, for which she earned her first Tony nomination.[1] She is considered to be one of the foremost theater actresses in the United States.

In recent years, Jones has ventured into the film industry, in which she has played mostly supporting roles. Her screen credits include Cradle Will Rock, The Perfect Storm, Ocean's Twelve, Signs, The Village.[2]

Jones will play President Allison Taylor on the seventh season of the Fox series 24.[3]

Personal life
Jones was born in Paris, Tennessee, to a high school teacher mother and a flower shop owner father.[4] Jones, who is a lesbian, has long been frank about her sexuality and romantic engagements.[citation needed] In 1995, when Jones accepted her first Tony Award, she thanked her then partner, architect Mary O'Connor. When she accepted her Best Actress Tony in 2005 for her work in Doubt, she thanked "Laura Wingfield", a character in the then-current Broadway revival of The Glass Menagerie, played by actress Sarah Paulson, Jones' current partner.[5]

The thing about Jones is, one gets this sense of... substance for lack of a better word. And yes, usually I am more about the flash of the rolled "r" and the maniacal spark in an actor who loves acting's eye.* But being theatrically trained doesn't just mean being able to declaim to the back row of another theater (in another town), as much as that is fun. It is being able to communicate silently to the back row of another theatre (in another town).

Cherry Jones could emote the phone book.

Which is not to say she's not fun... she is very much part of the crime caper template in "Ocean's 12" and you're just going to have watch the film to know what I'm talking about.

But my favorite performance of hers is in "Cradle Will Rock". She plays Hallie Flanagan, the real life national director of the Federal Theatre Project. The beatific charm she brings to the part is something that the whole "history as Preston Sturges' screwball comedy" needs to balance the hellzapoppin atmosphere.

The Cherry Jones touch is one that helps ground and balance some of the best theater and film we have. Remember her face and name.

*Yeah, I know there's probably a better way of saying this. I really shouldn't blog after the 5th scotch.