Biography

Her father was of German and Irish descent and her mother was of Cuban and Irish ancestry.

In 1991, Mercedes won an Oscar for The Fisher King (1991) and a Tony for "Lost in Yonkers". Mercedes is one of five actresses to win the Tony and the Oscar in the same year. The others are Shirley Booth, Audrey Hepburn, Ellen Burstyn and Judi Dench.

Gave birth to her first child at age 28, a son Christopher Robert Ruehl in April 1976. Child's father is unknown to the public and Ruehl subsequently gave her son up for adoption. Reunited in the late 90s when he was 21 and became godfather to his half-brother, Jake Xavier Ruehl Geiser, born May 1997, adopted at 11-years old by Ruehl and Geiser.

Her brother, American-Australian columnist and humorist Peter Ruehl, passed away suddenly on April 12, 2011. A respected journalist/columnist for the Australian Financial Review, the 64 year-old was survived by his Australian wife, and three children: Mercedes, John, and Tom.

Her husband, David Geiser, is an abstract expressionist painter.

[accepting her Best Supporting Actress Oscar for The Fisher King (1991)] I went to New York to study acting the summer I was 21 and like thousands of actors before me and thousands of actors after me, I went through the usual scores of moonlighting jobs and the usual scores of rejection and the usual legions of prophets of doom who were always there and always at the ready to give you the up-to-minute odds against you ever making anything of yourself in this business. And at this moment, all of those doleful memories have suddenly transformed themselves into nothing more than the sort of charming and amusing anecdotes from my memoirs!

[on stage vs screen] Stage is harder, and it pays less, and it's gruelling and I like it much better. Because on stage it's the actor's medium; film is the director's medium and television is arguably the producer/writer's medium. But on stage, you get out there, you're creating a character, nobody can pull you off, nobody can edit you and you can get deeply into a character and dwell there.

[on The Warriors (1979)] That's the first thing I ever did. I remember filming that little scene and being terrified, just a scared thing, like a quivering aspen leaf. I wasn't prepared for it.

[on Married to the Mob (1988)] The first day shooting, I got there, like, two hours early. I got suited up in all that makeup, which was a lot because we were playing Long Island mob housewives. I'd been working my five lines all that time, just pacing-pacing-pacing. Finally, just before I walk on the set, I decide I'm going to go to the bathroom one more time. So I go. And I get locked in the bathroom. Now, there's so much happening on the set that nobody can hear me knocking and calling. And I'm thinking, "I am dead in the water. I am an unemployed actress." Finally, somebody springs me from the bathroom, and I get on the set and everybody laughs, thank god. From that moment on, working on the movie was delightful.

[accepting her Tony award for Lost in Yonkers] Thank you. This is one of the great moments of my life. It's very hard to breathe. With all due respect to the great House of Chanel, the dress doesn't make it any easier!