Who

The former Dawson's Creek star and ex-fiancée of the late Heath Ledger, Williams has managed to transition from teenybopper star to serious film actress.

Backstory

Pillow-lipped Williams grew up in rural Montana as one of five children; at age 15, she graduated from high school and emancipated herself from her parents in order to pursue the acting career they disapproved of. In the late '90s she earned her big break acting alongside Katie Holmes on the teen drama Dawson's Creek, and had her first starring film role as a giggly teen opposite Kirsten Dunst in the 1999 Watergate satire Dick. Williams then sought out some acting cred, appearing in a string of indie films including Prozac Nation with Christina Ricci (which was filmed in 2001 but didn't see the light of day until 2005), The United States of Leland with Ryan Gosling, and 2003's The Station Agent with Peter Dinklage. But it was her portrayal of Heath Ledger's spurned wife in Ang Lee's 2005 gay-cowboy drama Brokeback Mountain that earned her truly substantial critical acclaim and an Oscar nomination. Continuing to eschew mainstream froth, post-Brokeback she's taken parts in Ethan Hawke's The Hottest State and Todd Haynes I'm Not There.

Family ties

Her dad is investor Larry Williams, who wrote the 1979 book How I Made $1,000,000 Trading Commodities Last Year. Michelle apparently inherited her dad's financial smarts—she won an investing competition when she was 16 years old—but not his legal troubles: Williams pere was arrested on tax evasion charges in May 2006 and later fled to Australia.

Personal

After dating musicians Andy Herod of the Comas and Conor Oberst of Bright Eyes, Williams got together with Heath Ledger in 2004 on the set of Brokeback Mountain and welcomed a daughter, Matilda, into the world in October 2005. Although Ledger and Williams were spotted applying for a marriage license in 2006, they never actually got married, and eventually split up in August 2007, a few months shy of Ledger's untimely death. Williams still lives in the Boerum Hill townhouse the couple bought in 2005.