Article courtesy Bloomberg: Mamie Gummer merely has to point a critical finger or raise a skeptical eyebrow to send waves of recognition across the footlights to an audience. She is – especially as she steadily improves her craft – the image of her mother, Meryl Streep. That’s reason enough to see this young actress in David Ives’s rowdy, proudly vulgar adaptation of Moliere’s “The Misanthrope.” Gowned to the teeth in William Ivey Long’s resplendent period gowns – the lingo may be contemporary but the period is 17th-century Paris – she tosses off Ives’s glinting, gauche couplets with consummate ease. There are actual footlights at the Classic Stage Company’s jewel-box theater in downtown Manhattan. And little else in John Lee Beatty’s uncharacteristically spare set. A glittering chandelier (pure Moliere and pure CSC at once) and a tall armoire serving as desk and closet are pretty much it. Gummer plays Celimene, the young, beautiful widow who is the undoing of the title character, a miserable, unhappy, verbal bully (he’s a drama critic, naturally) named Frank and played with ponyish glee by Hamish Linklater. Frank has come to visit his sole friend, Philante (the ideal sidekick, Hoon Lee) and immediately reduces everyone around him to wreckage.

Until, that is, he meets Gummer’s Celimene, the beautiful young widow and best friend of Philante’s intended, Elainte (Jenn Gambatese). Celimene parries Frank’s verbal thrusts and there are more plots than a Brooklyn cemetery, all of which must be tied up before the ending. But it’s a comedy after all, and you know what happens. Walter Bobbie’s exuberant production looks and sounds a bit like a graduation class exercise: It’s a little too confident that its smarty-pants rhyming firecrackers from “comedy’s top mensch,” as the opening lines have it, will rule the day. But it’s good fun; Hoon, Gambetese and Alison Fraser, as Arsinoe, Celimene’s gossip-mongering nemesis, all get their scene- stealing arias. Be warned: If you’re sitting in the front row, watch out for flying canapes.

Mamie is featured with a stunning pictorial in the May 2011 issue of Marie Claire Fashion. Pictures can be found in the gallery.

Article courtesy Movieline: If you thought that Mamie Gummer — who is co-starring in Shonda Rhimes’ new medical drama Off the Map — has received valuable acting tips from her mother, 16-time-Oscar-nominated legend Meryl Streep, you’re wrong. “We don’t really talk shop at home. [She talks about] things that any other mother would try to convey, like things about SPF,” The second generation Streep wearily told critics at this afternoon’s TCA Press tour. “But no, and I totally understand [why people would think that], but it’s not like we own a pizza joint and there is a secret sauce that stays in the family.” Translation: Please stop asking!

Article courtesy the New York Daily News: New Yorker Mamie Gummer had no idea what to expect when she landed a starring role on ABC’s new drama “Off the Map.” “It was a steady and stable job in a down economy,” she says. “And [with] a little bit of naivete, I thought, ‘Wouldn’t it be fun to be living in Hawaii? I guess I wasn’t anticipating fully I could be here for a long time.” If she didn’t know what the job might have in store for her, it’s no surprise. “Off the Map” is Gummer’s first regular series role — in fact, her first leading TV role in a career that started in 2005 and has included Broadway and Off-Broadway theater (for the latter, she earned a Lucille Lortel nomination for Outstanding Featured Actress). She’s also a familiar face for her work on HBO’s “John Adams,” in which she played Adams’ daughter.

Despite being something of a newcomer, though, Gummer is no stranger to fame; her mother is Oscar winner Meryl Streep. “Off the Map,” which premieres Wednesday at 10 p.m., is the latest series from Shonda Rhimes and Betsy Beers, the forces behind “Grey’s Anatomy” and “Private Practice.” It revolves around six doctors looking for a new start who have gone to an outpost in the Amazon to help others while also helping themselves. The easy label – one everyone involved in the show hates — is “‘Grey’s Anatomy’ in the jungle.” The two series are similar in many ways, considering that they’re both about the lives and loves of a group of attractive doctors, but “Off the Map” also has a bit of adventure thrown in. The show is shot in a remote corner of Hawaii. “I feel transported,” Gummer says. “It’s down this winding dirt road. They had to clear a road into the valley. You do feel far away.” Read full story »

With many thanks to my friend Mariana, some amazing scans have added to the Image Library. They include the most recent Elle (October issue) with Mamie and sister Grace, last year’s Paper Magazine’s 25th Anniversary issue as well as articles in Gotham Magazine (2008) and again Paper Magazine (2007). Thanks and enjoy reading!

Elle magazine is celebrating its 25th anniversary this year. This month’s special issue features 25 twenty-somethings, including Amanda Seyfried, Anna Kendrick, Lea Michele as well as Mamie and Grace Gummer. During the photo shoot, photographer Carter Smith set up a video camera and interviewed the young women on remembrances of birthdays past. It’s a very charming video, directed by Smith, especially since the women are dolled up for their Elle moment but seem disaffected at the same time. The clip can be watched here, a picture from the photoshoot below the quote.

“My parents asked me if I either wanted to go to Disneyworld or ‘Fiddler on the Roof,’” Grace Gummer, daughter of Meryl Streep says with a snicker. “I chose Fiddler on the Roof.” “I hated you for that,” her sister Mamie says. Later the Gummer sisters share a significant look when asked if their mother has ever thrown them a birthday party. (Answer: No.)