Best known for her role as sardonic sourball Miranda on HBO's Sex and the City, Nixon is also successful off-screen: she is the recipient of two Screen Actors Guild Awards, two Emmys, a Tony, and a Grammy.

A born-and-bred New Yorker, Nixon stayed close to home during college and enrolled at Barnard. As a freshman, she demonstrated her talent for multitasking: in addition to classes, she appeared in not one, but two, hit Broadway plays directed by Mike Nichols. In the late 80s and 90s Nixon had several small roles on TV and on Broadway, but her big break came in 1998 when she was cast as successful lawyer (and Carrie's best friend), Miranda Hobbes, on Sex and the City. She took home the Emmy in 2004 for her portrayal of Miranda in the show's final season. Following Sex and the City, Nixon returned to Broadway and snagged the Tony for Best Actress in a Leading role for Rabbit Hole. Despite her success on stage, Nixon decided to return with the rest of the cast for the 2008 Sex and the City Movie. In 2009 she took a break from playing Miranda to win a spoken word Emmy, alongside Beau Bridges and Blair Underwood, for An Inconvenient Truth. And in 2010 she once again (and finally, we hope) reprised her role as Miranda in Sex and the City 2. Perhaps being three quarters of her way to an EGOT helps her forget just how bad SATC 2 was.

Nixon's love-life has played a large role in her public persona: in 2003 she left her long-term boyfriend, Danny Mozes, for her now fiance Christine Marinoni, or, as Nixon describes her, "basically a short man with boobs." Nixon has three children: two with Danny, and one with Christine. [Image via AP]