There's a bit of Diane Keaton to Greta Gerwig: smart, idiosyncratic and appealing, both neurotic and loose-limbed and glowy. But the proof that Keaton and Gerwig came-of-age in different generations is the way in which Gerwig, 33, has taken the reins of production, turning from muse to master, so early in her career. After rising in the acting ranks, even co-starring in Allen's To Rome with Love, the Sacramento native and transplanted New Yorker both wrote and acted in her director-partner Noah Baumbach's Mistress America. She's currently in post-production on her feature writer-directorial debut, Lady Bird, starring Saorse Ronan and Lucas Hedges. Meanwhile, Gerwig currently has three films in awards contention – Jackie, Maggie's Plan and 20th Century Women – and is a potential supporting nominee for the latter. As Abbie in Mike Mills' semi-autobiographical period dramedy, Gerwig plays an aspiring photographer who returns home to Santa Barbara from New York in 1979 after being diagnosed with cervical cancer – and moves in with Annette Bening's chain-smoking earth mother Dorothea.
