Ethnicity 1: Jewish

Nationality 1: American

Birthdate: 1945

Deborah Eisenberg was born in Chicago, Illinois, on November 20, 1945. She grew up in Winnetka, a middle-class Chicago suburb. Her father, George, was a pediatrician, and her mother, Ruth, was a housewife. As one of the few Jewish students at her school, wearing a full-torso brace to correct her scoliosis, Eisenberg was a misfit and, according to Dinitia Smith, a self-admitted “behavior problem.” Her parents responded by sending her to boarding school in Vermont in the early 1960s. Afterwards, she stayed on in Vermont to attend Marlboro College, studying Latin and Greek. Then Eisenberg left Vermont for New York City, where she earned a B.A. at the New School for Social Research in 1968.

Eisenberg worked in New York for seven years as a secretary and waitress before she became a writer. It was during this time that she met actor Wallace...