The Life of Television and Film Star Jennifer Coolidge

Her breakthrough arrived in 1999, when she played Jeanine Stifler in American Pie. Audiences quickly knew the character by another name: Stifler’s mom, the confident older woman who became one of the film’s most quoted comic figures.

The role made her recognizable almost overnight. After years of small parts, she suddenly had a character people remembered, repeated, and associated with the raunchy teen-comedy boom that was reshaping her career.