After appearing in several plays, she moved to Los Angeles, California and in 1987 got her first break in a role in Walt Disney's made-for-TV film Student Exchange. Tierney's first starring role in a film was in a low-budget, independently-produced film called Dead Women in Lingerie, shot in 24 days. The film, a thriller with opening and closing credits paying tribute to illegal immigrants post-1986, Read more...

Tierney was born and raised in the Hyde Park neighborhood of Boston, Massachusetts. Her mother, Pat, is a real estate broker (of Stanton and Tierney Real Estate) in Boston. Her father, Joseph Tierney, was a prominent Boston politician who served on the Boston City Council for 15 years. Tierney is of Irish descent. She attended Notre Dame Academy in Hingham, Massachusetts, where her studies included Read more...

Maura Lynn Tierney (Boston, Massachusetts, February 3, 1965) is an Emmy-nominated American actress, known for her roles on television, particularly as a cast member of the 1990s situation comedy NewsRadio and, later, the long-running medical drama ER.