The Prize Winner of Defiance Ohio (2005)

Cast and Crew

Director

Producer

Screenwriter

Starring

• Julianne Moore as Evelyn Ryan
• Woody Harrelson as Leo "Kelly" Ryan
• Laura Dern as Dortha Schaefer
• Trevor Morgan
• Frank Chiesurin
• Jordan Todosey
• Erik Knudsen
• Brando Barbaro
• Luca Barbaro

Movie Story

Based on a true story, "The Prize Winner of Defiance, Ohio" stars four-time Academy Award nominee Julianne Moore ("Far From Heaven," "The Hours," "The End of the Affair," "Boogie Nights"), Oscar nominee Woody Harrelson ("The People vs. Larry Flynt") and Oscar nominee Laura Dern ("Rambling Rose," "We Don't Live Here Anymore") in the story of a woman who defies the odds to keep a roof over her family's heads.

Evelyn Ryan (Julianne Moore) is a devoted housewife and mother of ten in the 1950s. Her husband (Woody Harrelson) can't seem to make ends meet, but that doesn't stop the car from breaking down, the mortgage coming due and the bills from piling up. It falls to Evelyn to defy the conventions of the day and find a way to keep her family together with the odds stacked against them. Applying her remarkable resourcefulness and an uncommon wit, Evelyn finds her own way in the profitable jingle contests popular in the 1950s and '60s.

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