Family and early life:
Thurman`s mother, Nena Birgitte Caroline von Schlebrügge (b. 1941), was a fashion model who was born in Mexico City, Mexico, to German nobleman Friedrich Karl Johannes von Schlebrügge, and Birgit Holmquist, who was from Trelleborg, Sweden. Birgit Holmquist, Thurman`s grandmother, had stood model in 1930 for the statue of a nude woman that still stands overlooking the harbor of Smygehuk. Thurman`s father, Robert Alexander Farrar Thurman, was born in New York City to Elizabeth Dean Farrar, a stage actress, and Beverly Reid Thurman, Jr., an Associated Press editor and U.N. translator. Thurman`s mother was briefly married in 1964 to LSD guru Timothy Leary after the two were introduced by Salvador Dalí; she married Thurman`s father in 1967.

Thurman`s father, who would later become a recognized scholar and professor at Columbia University of Indo-Tibetan Buddhist studies, was the first westerner to be ordained as a Tibetan Buddhist monk. He gave his children a Buddhist upbringing: Uma is named after an Dbuma Chenpo (in Tibetan, "db" is silent; Mahamadhyamaka in Sanskrit, meaning "Great Middle Way") and pronounced /umə/ in General American, not /jumə/. She has three brothers, Ganden (b. 1971), Dechen (b. 1973) and Mipam (b. 1978), and a half-sister named Taya (b. 1960) from her father`s previous marriage. She and her siblings spent extended amounts of time in Almora, India as children, and the Dalai Lama would sometimes visit their home.

Since Professor Thurman moved between various universities, the family often relocated when Uma was a child. She grew up mostly in Amherst, Massachusetts and Woodstock, New York. Thurman is described as having been an awkward and introverted young girl who was frequently teased as a child for her tall frame, unique angular bone structure, unusual name (sometimes using the name “Uma Karen” instead of her birth-name), and size 11 feet (Thurman`s famously large feet would later be lovingly filmed by Quentin Tarantino in the films he made with her). Even friends made a point of highlighting her unusual features — when she was ten years old, a friend`s mother suggested she receive a nose job.

Although these unique physical attributes would later make her beauty iconic, these childhood attentions may have led to her bouts with body dysmorphic disorder, a syndrome involving a disturbed body image, which she discussed in an interview with Talk magazine in 2001.

Thurman attended Northfield Mount Hermon, a college preparatory boarding school in Northfield, Massachusetts, where she received her first acting experiences in school plays. She was unathletic and earned average grades in school, but excelled in acting from a young age. It was after performing as Abigail in a production of The Crucible that she was noticed by talent scouts, and was persuaded to act professionally. Thurman left her high school to pursue an acting career in New York City and to attend the Professional Children`s School where she dropped out before graduating.

Personal life
Relationships and family:

Uma Thurman at Cannes, 2000.While living in London to avoid the Dangerous Liaisons hype, she began dating director Phil Joanou, who had just produced U2’s movie Rattle and Hum in 1988. While visiting the set of his latest project, State Of Grace, she met English actor Gary Oldman. The two hit it off immediately and were married in 1990, but the marriage only lasted two

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