Jessica Alba (Celebrity Secrets)
Thursday, April 13, 2006
Biography
Early lifeAlba was born in Pomona, California to Mark Alba and Cathy Jensen. Her father is a Mexican American, while her maternal grandfather was of Danish descent and her Canadian maternal grandmother was of French, English and Italian descent. Alba was raised in an Air Force family, living with her heavily Catholic parents,[1] her brother Joshua, and her grandparents until she was sixteen. She grew up a sports fanatic. Her father's Air Force career took the family to Biloxi, Mississippi, and Del Rio, Texas, before they settled back in California when she was nine. Alba's early life had been marked by a multitude of physical maladies, as she suffered collapsed lungs twice, had pneumonia 4-5 times a year, proteinuria, a burst appendix, a cyst on her tonsils, and asthma. This served to isolate her from other children at school because, as she claims, she was in the hospital so often that no one knew her well enough to befriend her. She also revealed on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno that she suffered from obsessive-compulsive disorder as a child. Her health improved, however, when her family moved to California.
Alba had expressed interest in acting since the age of five. She took her first acting class at age twelve, and she was signed by an acting agent nine months later.
CareerAlba's first appearance in film was a small role in the 1994 feature Camp Nowhere, as Gail. She was originally hired for two weeks but her role soon turned into a two month job when the actress in one of the more prominent roles in the film dropped out, and Alba was picked to replace her because her hair matched that of the original actress.
Alba on the cover of EsquireYoung Alba appeared in two national TV commercials for Nintendo and J.C. Penney, and later she was featured in several independent films. She branched out into TV in 1994 with a recurring role as the insufferable young snob Jessica in three episodes of the Nickelodeon comedy series The Secret World of Alex Mack. She then performed the role of Maya in the first two seasons of the TV series Flipper. Under the tutelage of her lifeguard mother, Alba had learned to swim before she could walk, and she was a PADI-certified scuba diver, skills which were put to good use on the show, which was filmed in Australia. In 1995 she appeared in the film Venus Rising as Young Eve.
After graduating from high school at the age of 16, Alba studied acting with William H. Macy and his wife, Felicity Huffman, at the Atlantic Theater Company, which was developed by Macy and Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright and film director David Mamet.
In 1998 she appeared as Melissa Hauer in a first-season episode of the Steven Bochco crime-drama Brooklyn South, as Leanne in two episodes of Beverly Hills 90210, and as Layla in an episode of The Love Boat: The Next Wave. In 1999 she appeared in the Randy Quaid comedy feature P.U.N.K.S..
Alba rose to greater prominence in Hollywood in 1999 after appearing as a member of a snobby high school clique in the Drew Barrymore romantic comedy Never Been Kissed, and as the female lead in the 1999 comedy-horror film Idle Hands, opposite Devon Sawa. Her big break may have been as the star of the Fox sci-fi TV series Dark Angel, which was co-created by writer/director James Cameron, who picked Alba from a pool of 1,200 candidates for the role of the genetically-engineered super-soldier, Max Guevera. The show ran for two seasons before being canceled in 2002. Since then her most notable roles have been as an aspiring dancer/choreographer in Honey, exotic dancer Nancy Callahan in Sin City, and as the classic Marvel Comics character Sue Storm as The Invisible Woman in the Fantastic Four.
Alba's most prominent award nomination to date is that of a Golden Globe for "Lead Actress in a Drama Series" (TV) during the first season of Dark Angel.
She once told Dark Angel producer James Cameron that she did not want to direct because it appeared to be too difficult an undertaking, but he responded with the prediction that she would end up directing sooner than she expected.
According to pagesix.com, she fears being typecast as a sex kitten. But she said, "Somehow, I don't think this is happening to Natalie Portman." In the interview, Alba says she wants to be taken seriously as an actress, but believes she needs to do movies that she would otherwise not be interested in to build her career, stating that eventually she hopes to be more selective in her film projects.
Personal life Alba on The Tonight Show with Jay LenoAlba suffered anorexia[2] and a kidney infection in 2001.
Alba was engaged to her Dark Angel co-star Michael Weatherly, but it was called off. In January 2005, she began dating Cash Warren, a director's assistant on Fantastic Four, whom she met when filming that movie.
Regarding children, Alba has stated:
"I'm really girly when it comes to kids. I've been surrounded by kids my whole life because I'm the oldest of 15 cousins — I've been changing diapers since I was six. I want to have a couple, for sure."
Alba announced on the UK teen website "Teen Today" in 2005, prior to the birth of her brother's child, that she was beginning a children's clothing line:
"About four of my girlfriends have babies so they have no time for me. I figure if I can do baby clothes maybe they'll have more time to hang out!" [3]
She is a self-professed animal lover (although she dislikes reptiles, rodents). She also revealed that she "hates cats" in an interview with Conan O'Brien in 2001.
ReligionDuring an interview with GQ magazine, Alba said that in her teen years she became a born-again Christian in a rebellion against her parents, but told Access Hollywood that she abandoned this because "a lot of people gave me a lot of grief for just being a woman and made me feel ashamed for having a body because it 'tempted men.'"
As the daughter of conservative parents, Alba, whose grandparents did not even allow her to wear a bathing suit around the house, maintains a no-nudity clause in her contract, though she has claimed she had been willing to be nude in Sin City. She remarked of a GQ shoot in which she was scantily-clad:
"They didn't want me to wear the granny panties but I said, 'If I'm gonna be topless I need to wear granny panties."
Trivia Alba on the controversial cover of the March 2006 issue of PlayboyNominated as "Worst Actress" for both Fantastic Four and Into the Blue for the 26th annual Razzie Awards.
On E's "101 Sexiest Bodies", Alba was placed at 3rd, behind Brad Pitt in 2nd, and Angelina Jolie in 1st.
Alba's image was used in the Need for Speed: Most Wanted computer and video game.
Her brother Joshua appeared with her in "And Jesus Brought a Casserole," the first season finale of Dark Angel, in which he played Krit, one of her X-5 brothers who wanted to help destroy Manticore.
After Dark Angel, Alba dyed her hair blond for her role as Sue Storm in the 2005 film Fantastic Four, a look she has since kept.
She has a tattoo of a daisy with a ladybird on it on the back of her neck, one of a butterfly just above her lower back and a recently made one in her wrist, a Sanskrit symbol meaning "padma", the Sanskrit word for lotus flower.
According to an interview with Rolling Stone magazine, her measurements are 34-25-34.
Alba revealed that she envisions a much older man as her ideal partner, having stated, "Morgan Freeman, Sean Connery, Robert Redford, Michael Caine. I have this thing for older men. They've been around and know so much."
Playboy magazine named Alba among its 25 Sexiest Celebrities, and the Sex Star of the Year in its March 2006 issue, on whose cover she appeared. Alba was involved in a litigation against Playboy for its use of her image (from a promotional shot for Into the Blue) without her consent, which she contends gave the appearance that she was featured in the issue in a "nude or semi-nude pictorial." However she later dropped the lawsuit after receiving a personal apology from Playboy owner Hugh Hefner, who also agreed to make donations to two charities that Alba has supported.
