Cynthia Gibb

Cynthia Lowrie Gibb, also credited as Cindy Gibb, is an American actress and former model who has worked across film and television. She first gained wide attention as a cast member on the musical television drama Fame and went on to appear in numerous feature films and television productions.

Gibb was born on December 14, 1963, in Bennington, Vermont. She grew up in Westport, Connecticut, where she attended Staples High School.

Her career began at age 14 when she signed with the Ford Modeling Agency in New York City. During her modeling career, she appeared on the covers of Vogue and Young Miss magazines. Her early exposure in modeling led to her initial acting role as a Young Fan in Woody Allen's 1980 film Stardust Memories.

Gibb's television career expanded in the early 1980s when she played Susan Martin Wyatt Carter on the soap opera Search for Tomorrow from 1981 to 1983. She subsequently joined the cast of Fame, serving as a series regular for three of its six seasons. On film, she secured her first female lead role as Jessie Chadwick in the 1986 sports drama Youngblood alongside Rob Lowe and Patrick Swayze. That same year, she played an American lay missionary in Oliver Stone's drama Salvador.

Throughout the late 1980s and 1990s, Gibb appeared in feature films such as Malone (1987), Short Circuit 2 (1988), and Death Warrant (1990). On television, she starred in the NBC sitcom Madman of the People from 1994 to 1995 and the UPN series Deadly Games from 1995 to 1997. Her additional television guest appearances include roles in series such as 7th Heaven, Judging Amy, Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, Without A Trace, and Criminal Minds.

Gibb has starred in a wide variety of television movies. She portrayed Karen Carpenter in the lead role of The Karen Carpenter Story, which aired on CBS on January 1, 1989, and became the highest-rated TV movie of that year. Between 1992 and 1993, she played Dr. Amanda Bentley in three Diagnosis: Murder television movies. In 2002, she starred as Mary Maloney opposite John Schneider in Mary Christmas.

For her performance as the adult Gypsy Rose Lee opposite Bette Midler in the 1993 TV adaptation of Gypsy, Gibb earned a Golden Globe Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress – Series, Miniseries or Television Film.