"I THINK WOMEN ARE ENDLESSLY FASCINATING ESPECIALLY OLDER WOMEN, AND I WOULD LOVE TO SEE THEM MORE."

PRIDES AND JOYS

FROM LEONARDO DICAPRIO TO JULIA ROBERTS TO THAT BABY EATEN BY A DINGO, MERYL STREEP HAS PLAYED MOTHER TO THREE GENERATIONS OF ACTORS. A LOOK BACK AT SOME OF HER MOST MEMORABLE ON-SCREEN KIDS

JOE REID

(ADAPTED FROM VANITYFAIR.COM, AUGUST 7, 2015)

'Children keep you anchored to reality," Meryl Streep told Vanity Fair in 1998. "You're on a movie set and everyone gets you coffee and asks you what you need. And then I go home and I'm waiting on tables like I was in college." With experiences like these, it's no surprise Streep has spent so much of her career playing mothers. She has taken roles of women suffering the traumatic loss of their children (Sophie's Choice, A Cry in the Dark), and those trying to make peace with kids who've become strong-minded adults (A Prairie Home Companion, One True Thing).

With four children of her own, Streep has always insisted that motherhood is a serious and creative enterprise in its own right. When asked, by The New York Times in 1994, why she hadn't formed her own production company, she responded: "I have four kids and that's a big development company right there. People sometimes look at my life and think this is all effortlessly done. All these kids and it all works so easily. It doesn't. Not at all."

Here are some of the most notable motherchild relationships of Streep's four-decade screen career.

1979

BILLY KRAMER, KRAMER VS. KRAMER Played by Justin Henry

He's the most important Kramer, in that he's the fulcrum around which the rest of the film moves. And the heart of the movie is certainly the combative/ loving relationship Billy has with his father. By design, Billy has less of an on-screen relationship with his mother, but Streep's Oscar-winning performance certainly does a lot to fill in the gaps about what that mother/ son relationship was like. Henry would go on to appear in the John Hughes classic Sixteen Candles and popped up on TV in Fantasy Island and ER.

1982

EVA AND JAN, SOPHIE'S CHOICE Played by Jennifer Lawn and Adrian Kalitka

Sophie's two children were so lovably cute it's hard to say which was best. That's why they call it a "Sophie's choice," right? How can you choose? That said, and not to put too fine a point on it, Sophie made her choice. Who are we to argue with it? Sorry Eva.

1986

ANNIE FORMAN, HEARTBURN Played by Mamie Gummer

Streep's eldest daughter, Mamie Gummer, made herscreen debut in this divorce comedy. The New York Times was impressed, saying she was "already accomplished enough to steal scenes even from Miss Streep."

1998

RIAN GULDEN AND ELLEN GULDEN, ONE TRUE THING Played by Tom Everett Scott and Renee Zellweger

1996

JUDITH RYAN, BEFORE AND AFTER Played by Julia Weldoi

2002

JULIA VAUGHAN, THE HOURS Played by Claire Danes

Julia is actually great. Yes, O.K., she isattimesa source of ambivalence for her mother, Clarissa, and about the choices Clarissa made and didn't make in her life. But she's a very loving daughter, she comes overto help her mom prepare for the big party she's throwing for Richard, even though Julia is clearly pretty much over Richard as a person. She even knows enough to recognize that Louis Waters (Jeff Daniels) is ridiculous. And though it doesn't have anything to do with Clarissa, the moment Julia shares with Old Laura Brown at the end of the film is incredibly touching.

2004

CONGRESSMAN RAYMOND SHAW, THE MANCHURIAN CANDIDATE Played by Liev Schreiber

Such a disappointment. Things were going so well for Raymond and his mother. The conditioning had worked. The trigger words were doing what trigger words do. Jon Voight's senator was disposed of when he got in the way. Raymond was all set to be the president of the United States, and then it all fell apart. That ungrateful, brainwashed brat of a child got both his mother and himself killed. Thanks for nothing, son.

2005

DAVID BLOOMBERG, PRIME Played by Bryan Greenberg

You have to feel for David at least a little, having his new relationship to slightly older but still way out of his league Uma Thurman deep-sixed by his therapist mom. Of course, nobody told him to sleep with Thurman's model friend while they were fighting. Clearly he's a crap boyfriend, but he's still a pretty good son, all things considered.

2006

LOLAJOHNSON, A PRAIRIE HOME COMPANION Played by Lindsay Lohan

This underrated gem of a movie features Streep and Lohan as mother and daughter singers (along with Lily Tomlin as Streep's sister) on a dying public radio show. They're not really estranged, but Lola has become increasingly unknowable to Streep's Yolanda, writing poems about suicide and singing songs about death by squirrels. Yolanda's attempts to connect to her daughter are a little sweet, a little sad, and a little funny—all the things the film is, and that's not even getting into the meta-narrative of wishing Lohan (who'd already begun the tabloidspiral era of her career) could stay underthe caring guidance of women like Streep and Tomlin.

2008

SOPHIE SHERIDAN, MAMMA MIA! Played by Amanda Seyfried

Sophie seems like a fun daughter! It's even hard to hold it against her that she schemed to bring three of her mom's exes to their little Greek island in order to play a high-stakes game of paternity bingo. And the "Slipping Through My Fingers" scene is a genuinely sweet moment.

2009

LAUREN ADLER, LUKE ADLER, AND GABBY ADLER IT'S COMPLICATED Played by Caitlin Fitzgerald, Hunter Parrish, and Zoe Kazan

Lauren is the oldest of the Adler siblings, but her romantic taste seems as untrustworthy as her divorced parents' were. Her fiance is way, way, WAY too interested in the gossip of his 60-something prospective in-laws and whether or not they're doing it. Luke, on the other hand, is utterly adorable. As the baby of the Adler family it's easy to cut him some slack, even though he and his siblings are emotionally needy monsters. Unfortanately, Gabby is the worst of the three. She texts herfriends and ignores her mom's attempts to say goodbye as she's moving out. The cold shoulder leaves her mother feeling abandoned as she tries to manage dating two men atthe same time.

2013

IVY WESTON, KAREN WESTON, AND BARBARA WESTON-FORDHAM, AUGUST: OSAGE COUNTY Played byJulianne Nicholson, Juliette Lewis, and Julia Roberts

Obviously, Streep and Roberts were going to be the ones to nab Oscar nominations for this movie, but wouldn't it have been so much more fun if it were Julianne Nicholson instead? She gives the film's best performance as put-upon, secretive Ivy, and even in the scenes where Violet (Streep) and Barbara (Roberts) are going after each other ("eat yourfish, eatyourfish, eat your fish"), Ivy's reactions tend to be the best parts. Ultimately, it's Violet's lack of concern for Ivy's feelings that leads to everything falling apart at the end, showing her true value within the family.

2014

RAPUNZEL, NTO THE WOODS Played by Mackenzie Mauzy

She didn't have the sense to stay at home, even though he adoptive mother warned her about the world outside. She doesn't die like she does in the musical. Instead, she runs away with her handsome prince and never sees her motheragain, which makes for a pretty disappointing child.

2015

JULIE, RICKI AND THE FLASH Played by Mamie Gummer

Almost 30 years after Heartburn, a grown-up Mamie Gummer again played Streep's fictional daughter, in this story of an aging rocker who returns home after years on the road. If it happens a third time, we'll have to call it typecasting.