Who

Barkin is an enduringly sultry actress and the most recent wife of Ron Perelman.

Backstory

The Bronx native made her on-screen debut in the 1981 made-for-NBC miniseries Kent State and appeared in Barry Levinson's Diner a year later. Since then, her gigs have improved only modestly—for the most part she's played supporting roles in big budget clunkers or starred in low-profile indies. She got down and dirty with Al Pacino in 1989's Sea of Love, and had smallish parts in Terry Gilliam's 1998 Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas and Todd Solondz's 2004 film Palindromes. Most recently, she had a second-string role in Steven Soderbergh's Ocean's Thirteen, the third installment in the crime caper franchise.

Personal

Barkin's personal life has tended to attract more attention than her career. Formerly married to actor Gabriel Byrne—a marriage that produced two kids, Jack and Romy Marion—the couple separated in 1993 and were divorced in 1999. She then married the notoriously temperamental Ron Perelman in 2000. One good sign you're marrying the wrong man: On the day of the wedding, Perelman's third wife, Patricia Duff, issued Barkin her condolences via a press release. Predictably, Perelman and Barkin didn't live happily ever after—the couple split in 2006. How much Barkin ended up collecting is unclear: Her camp says $20 million, while his friends say it was more like $60 million.

Drama

In a cheeky display of public retaliation, Barkin auctioned off the jewelry Perelman had given her during their marriage, netting $20.3 million at Christie's. Purging her jewelry box didn't exorcise all her anger. When the two bumped into each other at the Waverly Inn in November 2006, Barkin hurled a glass of water into his face, screamed that he was a wife-beater, then turned to his date and hissed, "I feel sorry for you that you have to fuck him tonight." Barkin later filed suit against Perelman for $3.4 million, claiming he'd backed out of a promise to finance her fledgling film production company, Applehead Pictures.

Family ties

Barkin's brother George is the former editor-in-chief of National Lampoon. He's a partner in Barkin's Applehead Pictures, along with Caroline Kaplan, formerly of IFC.

Habitat

After her split with Perelman, Barkin paid $7.5 million for a townhouse on West 12th Street.