JoBeth Williams

In Poltergeist (1982), JoBeth Williams and Craig T. Nelson play Diane and Steve Freeling as people accustomed to raising children together. Their ease makes the marriage convincing without asking us to spend much time admiring it. Williams does not announce Diane's devotion to the children; it is there in the way she responds when their home becomes unsafe. This is what she does particularly well: make a parent's concern seem ordinary enough that we share it when things go wrong.

Her film debut was as Phyllis Bernard in Kramer vs. Kramer (1979), and the early prominence of Poltergeist was followed by Karen Bowens in The Big Chill (1983). Those ensemble and family-centred films suit an actor whose warmth makes relationships credible. Desert Bloom (1986), in which she played Lily Chismore, belongs to the serious independent work she has singled out as important to her. The return as Diane in the 1986 Poltergeist sequel should not obscure that broader interest.

Tobe Hooper's Poltergeist makes substantial physical demands on Williams, but she keeps the distress recognisable rather than letting the exertion become the whole performance. We were frightened by Diane's helplessness in her own home, because Williams makes the inability to protect her children feel intolerable. The effects sometimes get too busy, and the actors have to keep us concerned about what is happening to the family. Nelson matters here: both actors respond to the disturbances as parents, without having to insist on how much the children mean to them.

Her later career has taken in features, television films and recurring television roles, with television sometimes providing stronger material than the films. We would not mistake smaller parts for a reason to overlook her. The ability to make people seem as though they belong to the same household is worth looking for even when it is not the main attraction. Start with Poltergeist, and do not dismiss the family scenes as time spent waiting for the haunting.