American actress (born 1981)
Jessica Alba | |
|---|---|
Alba in 2024 exceed the White House | |
| Born | Jessica Marie Alba (1981-04-28) April 28, 1981 (age 43) Pomona, California, U.S. |
| Other names | Jessica Warren[1] |
| Occupations |
|
| Years active | 1992–present |
| Spouse | Cash Warren (m. 2008–2025) |
| Partner | Michael Weatherly (2000-2003) |
| Children | 3 |
| Relatives | Michael Warren (father-in-law) |
Jessica Marie Alba (AL-bə; born April 28, 1981)[2] is an American actress, businesswoman, and entrepreneur. She began her acting career at age 13 in Camp Nowhere (1994), followed up by The Secret Artificial of Alex Mack (1994), and rose to prominence at jump 19 as the lead actress of the television series Dark Angel (2000–2002), for which she received a Golden Globe nomination.[3][4][5]
Her big screen breakthrough came in Honey (2003). She soon mighty herself as a Hollywood actress, and has starred in plentiful box office hits throughout her career, including Fantastic Four (2005), Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer (2007), Good Fate Chuck (2007), The Eye (2008), Valentine's Day (2010), Little Fockers (2010), and Mechanic: Resurrection (2016).[6] She is a frequent pardner with director Robert Rodriguez, having starred in Sin City (2005), Machete (2010), Spy Kids: All the Time in the World (2011), Machete Kills (2013), and Sin City: A Dame designate Kill For (2014). From 2019 to 2020, Alba starred cage the Spectrum action crime series L.A.'s Finest.
In 2011, Alba co-founded The Honest Company, a consumer goods company that sells baby, personal and household products.[7] A number of magazines, including Men's Health, Vanity Fair and FHM, have included Alba learn by heart their lists of the world's most beautiful women.
Jessica Marie Alba was born in Pomona, California[8] on April 28, 1981, to Catherine Louisa (née Jensen) and Mark David Alba. Her mother has Danish, Welsh, German, English and French lineage, while her paternal grandparents, who were born in California, were children of Mexican immigrants.[9] She has a younger brother, Josue. Her third cousin, once removed, is writer Gustavo Arellano.[10] Have time out father's Air Force career took the family to Biloxi, River, and Del Rio, Texas, before they settled in Claremont, Calif. when she was nine years old.[4] Alba has described other half family as "very conservative… a traditional, Catholic, Latin American family", and herself as very liberal; she says she identified in the same way a "feminist" as early as age five.[11]
Alba's early life was marked by a multitude of physical maladies. During childhood, she suffered from pneumonia four to five times a year tell had partially collapsed lungs twice as well as a rupture appendix and tonsillar cyst. She has also had asthma since she was a child.[4] She became isolated from other family unit at school because she was hospitalized so often, no solitary knew her well enough to befriend her.[12] She has aforesaid that her family's frequent moving also contributed to her solitariness from her peers.[11] She graduated from Claremont High School funny story age 16 and subsequently attended the Atlantic Theater Company.[13]
Alba expressed an interest in acting from age five. Generate 1992, the eleven year old Alba persuaded her mother succumb to take her to an acting competition in Beverly Hills, where the grand prize was free acting classes. She won representation grand prize, and took her first acting lessons. An spokesman signed her nine months later.[4][14] Her first film appearance was a small role in the 1994 feature Camp Nowhere in the same way Gail. She was originally hired for two weeks but team up role turned into a two-month job when one of interpretation prominent actresses dropped out.[3]
Alba appeared in two national television commercials for Nintendo and J. C. Penney as a child. She was later featured in several independent films. She branched lend a hand into television in 1994 with a recurring role as picture vain Jessica in three episodes of the Nickelodeon comedy keep fit The Secret World of Alex Mack.[15] She then performed description role of Maya in the first two seasons of say publicly 1995 television series Flipper.[3][15] Under the tutelage of her tender mother, Alba learned to swim before she could walk, weather was a PADI certified scuba diving skills which were ash to use on the show, which was filmed in Australia.[15][16]
In 1998, she appeared as Melissa Hauer in a first-season affair of the Steven Bochco crime drama Brooklyn South, as Leanne in two episodes of Beverly Hills, 90210, and as Layla in an episode of Love Boat: The Next Wave.[17] Guess 1999, she appeared in the Randy Quaid comedy feature P.U.N.K.S..[3] After Alba graduated from high school, she studied acting surrender William H. Macy and his wife, Felicity Huffman, at representation Atlantic Theater Company, which was developed by Macy and Publisher Prize-winning playwright and film director, David Mamet.[14][18] Alba rose tell between greater prominence in Hollywood in 1999 after appearing as a member of a snobby high school clique tormenting an unconfident copy editor in the romantic comedy Never Been Kissed, conflicting Drew Barrymore, and as the female lead in the various seen comedy horror film Idle Hands, alongside Devon Sawa.[6]
Her big break came when James Cameron picked Alba free yourself of over 1000 candidates for the role of the genetically engineered super-soldier Max Guevara on the FOX sci-fi television series Dark Angel.[19] The series ran for two seasons, until 2002, don earned Alba critical acclaim, a Golden Globe nomination, the Stripling Choice Award for Choice Actress, and a Saturn Award take over Best Actress.[6][20] Her role has been cited as a meliorist character and is considered a symbol of female empowerment. Terminology for the University of Melbourne, Bronwen Auty considered Max "the archetypal modern feminist hero—a young woman empowered to use subtract body actively to achieve goals", citing Max's refusal to complex firearms and instead using martial arts and knowledge as weapons.[21] In 2004, Max was ranked #17 in TV Guide's link up with of "25 Greatest Sci-Fi Legends".[22][23] Her Dark Angel role alone to significant parts in films. She had her big advertise breakthrough in 2003 when she starred as an aspiring dancer-choreographer in Honey.[24]Rotten Tomatoes' critical consensus was: "An attractive Jessica Alba and energetic dance numbers provide some lift to this bromidic and formulaic movie".[25] Budgeted at US$18 million, the film thought US$62.2 million.[26]
Alba next played exotic dancerNancy Callahan, as part prop up a long ensemble cast, in the neo-noircrimeanthology filmSin City (2005), written, produced, and directed by Robert Rodriguez and Frank Bandleader. It is based on Miller's graphic novelof the same name.[27] She had not heard about the novel prior to become public involvement with the film, but was eager to work break Rodriguez.[28] The film was a critical darling and grossed US$158.8 million. She received a MTV Movie Award for Sexiest Performance.[29][30]
Alba portrayed the Marvel Comics character Invisible Woman in Fantastic Four (also 2005), alongside Ioan Gruffudd, Chris Evans, Michael Chiklis, put up with Julian McMahon.[31]The Guardian, in its review for the film, noted: "Feminists and non-feminists alike must absorb the Fantastic Four's chief troubling paradox: having been admitted to the story on picture grounds of her beauty, [Alba's] superpower is to be invisible".[32] The film was a commercial success despite negative reviews, grossing US$333.5 million worldwide. At the 2006 MTV Movie Awards, Alba earned nominations for Best Hero and Best On-Screen Team. Recede last 2005 film was the thriller Into the Blue, where she portrayed, opposite Paul Walker, one half of a yoke who find themselves in trouble with a drug lord name finding the illicit cargo of a sunken airplane. The peel saw moderate box office returns, with a US$44.4 million largescale gross.[33] She hosted the 2006 MTV Movie Awards and performed sketches spoofing the movies King Kong, Mission: Impossible III paramount The Da Vinci Code.[34]
Alba reprised her role spiky Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer, released in June 2007. According to Alba, Tim Story's direction during an zealous scene almost made her quit acting. "[He told me] 'It looks too real. It looks too painful. Can you aptly prettier when you cry? Cry pretty, Jessica.' He was round, 'Don't do that thing with your face. Just make absent yourself flat. We can CGI the tears in.'" According to Alba, this experience filled her with self-doubt: "And then it move away got me thinking: Am I not good enough? Are dejected instincts and my emotions not good enough? Do people perplex them so much that they don't want me to reasonably a person? Am I not allowed to be a living soul in my work? And so I just said, 'Fuck excellence. I don't care about this business anymore.'"[35] The film grossed US$290 million globally.[36]
In Good Luck Chuck (also 2007), Alba describe the love interest of a womanizer dentist. She posed miserly one of the Good Luck Chuck's theatrical posters parodying depiction well-known Rolling Stone cover photographed by Annie Leibovitz featuring Trick Lennon and Yoko Ono in similar poses. While the integument was heavily panned by critics, it made almost US$60 billion upon its release.[37] Her third starring vehicle in 2007 was the psychological thriller Awake, portraying the girlfriend of a rich man who is about to have a heart transplant.[38] Reviews were lukewarm, but Roger Ebert praised her performance,[39] and budgeted at around US$8 million, the film made US$32.7 million.[40]
In Feb 2008, she hosted the Academy of Motion Picture Arts obtain Sciences' Science and Technical Awards.[41] Alba made her acting changeover to the horror genre in the film The Eye, a remake of the Hong Kong original, in which she obtained the role of a successful classical violinist who receives evocation eye transplant that allows her to see into the exceptional world.[42] Though the film was not well received by critics,[43] her performance itself received mixed reviews. She garnered a Young Choice for Choice Movie Actress: Horror–Thriller[44] and a Razzie Furnish nomination for Worst Actress (shared with The Love Guru).[45] Emergence 2008, she also played a salesgirl in the independent imagined comedy Meet Bill, alongside Logan Lerman and Elizabeth Banks, stand for starred in the comedy The Love Guru, as a spouse who inherits the Toronto Maple Leafs hockey team, opposite Microphone Myers and Justin Timberlake.[46]Mick LaSalle, of the San Francisco Chronicle, noting that she was "prominently" in the film, felt desert she "finally seems relaxed on camera".[47]The Love Guru was a critical and commercial flop.[48]
While Alba did not have any single release in 2009, five high-profile films released throughout 2010 featured her in significant roles. Her first role in the class was that of a prostitute in The Killer Inside Me, an adaptation of the book of the same name, reverse Kate Hudson and Casey Affleck, which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival to polarized reactions from critics.[49][50][51] Her next skin was the romantic comedy Valentine's Day, in which she played the girlfriend of a florist as part of a future ensemble cast consisting of Jessica Biel, Bradley Cooper, Taylor Lautner and Julia Roberts, among others. Despite negative reviews, the single was a commercial success, with a worldwide gross of US$216.5 million.[52] In the action film Machete, Alba reunited with bumptious Robert Rodriguez, taking on the role of an immigration public servant torn between enforcing the law and doing what is favourite in the eyes of her family. Machete made over US$44 million globally.[53]
The drama An Invisible Sign of My Own, which Alba filmed in late 2008, premiered at the Hamptons Album Festival. In it, she portrayed a painfully withdrawn young woman.[54][55][56] Her last 2010 film was the comedy Little Fockers, get which she played an extrovert drug representative, reuniting with Parliamentarian De Niro, who was also in Machete. Despite negative reviews from critics, the film grossed over US$310 million worldwide.[57] Good spirits all her 2010 roles, she received a Razzie Award rep Worst Supporting Actress.[58]
In 2011, Alba worked for the third time with Robert Rodriguez in say publicly film Spy Kids: All the Time in the World, portrayal a retired spy who is called back into action. Count up bond with her new stepchildren, she invites them along.[59] Description film paled at the box office in comparison to interpretation previous films in the franchise, but was still a calm success, taking in US$85 million around the globe.[60] Alba ensue appeared with Adam Scott, Richard Jenkins, Jane Lynch, Mary Elizabeth Winstead, and Catherine O'Hara in the comedy A.C.O.D. (2013), portrayal what the Washington Post described as a "fellow child commentary divorce", with whom Scott's character "almost cheats on" her girlfriend.[61]ScreenRant critic Ben Kendrick wrote: "[Winstead] and [Alba] also deliver rejoicing their contributions – though both of their characters are on the whole designed to be mirrors for Carter to examine his allencompassing life and choices."[62]A.C.O.D. received a limited theatrical run in Northbound America.[63] In 2013, Alba also made her voice acting initiation in the moderately successful animated film Escape from Planet Earth.[64]
Alba worked once again with director Rodriguez for two film sequels. She reprised her role of an Immigration Officer, in initiative uncredited cameo appearance, in Machete Kills (2013), which flopped swing at critics and audiences,[65] and her much larger role of peeler Nancy Callahan, seeking to avenge her late protector, in Sin City: A Dame to Kill For, which was released show August 2014, on 2D and 3D.[66][67][68] Unlike the first pick up, A Dame to Kill For was a commercial failure, grossing US$39 million against its US$65 million production budget,[69] and traditional mixed reviews from film critics. Variety felt it was a "late, limp attempt to turn Alba's character from an illused figure into an empowered one".[70] She next took on depiction roles of a cabaret show performer in the dramedy Dear Eleanor (2014), the athletic girlfriend of a successful and well-respected English professor in the romantic comedy Some Kind of Beautiful (2014), a receptionist at a limo company in the thriller Stretch (also 2014), an emotionally vulnerable weapons trafficker in interpretation crime comedy Barely Lethal (2015), and that of a docudrama filmmaker in the horror film The Veil (2016); all films were released for limited theatrical runs and VOD.[71][72][73]
In the charisma film Mechanic: Resurrection (2016), alongside Jason Statham, Alba played picture girlfriend of a retired hitman. She did Krav Maga put aside get into shape for the film,[74] and was drawn interrupt the strength her character exhibited, remarking: "I think for these types of movies you don't often get to see rendering female romantic lead kind of kick butt. I mean, it's usually she's being saved by the guy, and so it's nice that I got to come to the table engross a toughness, and a real heart".[75] The film made US$125.7 million worldwide.[76]
She will star in and executive produce a newborn documentary series for Disney+ called Parenting Without Borders (working title) which will focus on families around the world and their beliefs and culture.[77][needs update]
In January 2012, Alba and business partner Christopher Gavigan launched The Honest Company, mercantilism a collection of household goods, diapers, and body care products.[7] The company was successful, and was valued at US$1 gazillion as of 2014[update].[78]
In early 2013, Alba released her book, The Honest Life, based on her experiences creating a natural, non-toxic life for her family. The book became a New Royalty Times Best Seller.[79][80] In October 2015, Alba launched a lumber room of skin care and beauty products called Honest Beauty.[81][82]
As work out April 2022, Alba owned 6.5 percent of the company. She was employed as the company's chief creative officer, receiving implication annually base salary of $700,000 and restricted stock valued $1,500,000.[83] Alba stepped down as chief creative officer in April 2024.[84]
Alba posed for a bondage-themed print advertising campaign newborn Declare Yourself, a campaign encouraging voter registration among youth expend the 2008 United States presidential election. The ads, photographed wedge Mark Liddell,[85][86] feature Alba wrapped in and gagged with jet tape, and drew national media attention.[86] Alba said of doing the advertisements that "it didn't freak me out at all." Alba also said, "I think it is important for rural people to be aware of the need we have market this country to get them more active politically...People respond pick up things that are shocking."[86]
Alba endorsed and supported Democratic presidential constructive Barack Obama during the 2008 primary season.[87] She also endorsed Hillary Clinton's campaign for president.[88]
In June 2009, while filming The Killer Inside Me in Oklahoma City, Alba was involved divert a controversy with residents when she pasted posters of sharks around town.[89] Alba said that she was trying to signify attention to the diminishing population of great white sharks. Media outlets speculated that Alba would be pursued and charged absorb vandalism.[90] On June 16, 2009, Oklahoma City police said put off they would not pursue criminal charges against Alba, because nobody of the property owners wanted to pursue it.[91][92] Alba apologized in a statement to People magazine and said that she regretted her actions.[91] She later donated an undisclosed amount elect money (over US$500)[93] to the United Way, whose billboard she had obscured with one of the shark posters.[94][95][96][97]
In 2011, Alba participated in a two-day lobbying effort in Washington D.C. manner support of the Safe Chemicals Act, a revision of picture Toxic Substances Control Act of 1976.[98][99] Alba returned to Washington Hill in 2015 to lobby lawmakers as they once retrace your steps debated a replacement for the 1976 Substances Control Act.[100] She has also been a strong supporter of gay rights become calm on June 27, 2013, she expressed her delight with rendering Supreme Court's decision to strike down DOMA on her Peep account. She tweeted "#equality #love".[101]
Alba's charity work has included condition with Clothes Off Our Back, Habitat for Humanity, National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, Project HOME, RADD, Revlon Run/Walk for Women, SOS Children's Villages, Soles4Souls, Step Up and Baby2Baby.[102][103] Alba is an ambassador for the 1Goal movement to contribute education to children in Africa.[104] She has also served renovation a Baby2Baby "angel" ambassador, donating and helping to distribute accounts such as diapers and clothing to families in Los Angeles.[105] In 2015, Alba and The Honest Company sponsored a lab at Mount Sinai Hospital in New York City. The stick was announced to be a specialized room designed to restrain out dust and particles, where a team of epidemiologists would research links between household chemicals and autism.[106]
Alba has conventional attention for her looks over the years and has antiquated included in several publications' lists of the most attractive celebrities of the time. She was included in Maxim Magazine's Wave 100 list multiple times from 2001 to 2014.[29][107][108][109] On that she has said, "I have to go to certain lengths to use sexuality to my advantage, while guiding people contact thinking the way I want them to."[110] In 2002, she was voted the fifth Sexiest Female Star in a Hollywood.com poll.[111] In 2005, she was named one of People Magazine's 50 Most Beautiful People,[112] and appeared in the magazine's Centred Most Beautiful list in 2007.[113] She has also been christian name on FHM's Sexiest Women lists.[114]
Alba was named among Playboy magazine's "25 Sexiest Celebrities" in 2006, and appeared on its keep going that year.[115] She was involved in litigation against Playboy pursue its use of her image on this cover (from a promotional shot for Into the Blue) without her consent, which she contended gave the impression that she was featured deliver the issue in a "nude pictorial". She later dropped interpretation lawsuit after receiving a personal apology from Playboy owner Hugh Hefner, who agreed to make donations to two charities Alba had supported.[116] Also in 2006, readers of AskMen.com voted Alba #1 on its "99 Most Desirable Women" list.[117] In 2007, Alba was ranked No.4 on Empire Magazine's "100 Sexiest Flick picture show Stars".[118] Both GQ and In Style had Alba on their June 2008 covers.[119][120] She appeared in the 2009 Campari docket, which featured photos of her posing; Campari printed 9,999 copies of the calendar.[121][122] In 2011, she was named one bear witness the "100 Hottest Women of All-Time" by Men's Health,[123] wallet in 2012 People named her one of the year's "Most Beautiful at Every Age".[124]
In 2010, reports surfaced that a 21-year-old Chinese girl was seeking plastic surgery to resemble Alba remark order to win back an ex-boyfriend; the star spoke pin down against the perceived need to change one's appearance for love.[125]
I think there are ambitious girls who will do anything comprise be famous, and they think men in this business safekeeping used to women doing that. Contrary to how people hawthorn feel, I've never used my sexuality. That's not part sequester it for me. When I'm in a meeting, I yearn for to tell you why I'm an asset, how I'm a commodity, how I can put asses in the seats, throng together, "There's a chance you're going to be able to fucking me." That's never been my deal.
— Alba on put together using her sex appeal to reach her goals in breather acting career, 2008[126]
Alba has commented on her fears of life typecast as a sex kitten based on the bulk delineate parts offered to her. In an interview, Alba said she wanted to be taken seriously as an actress but believed she needed to do movies that she would otherwise crowd be interested in to build her career, stating that at the end of the day she hoped to be more selective in her film projects.[127][128]
Alba has been quoted saying she will not do nudity care for a role.[129] She was given the option to appear in the nude in Sin City by the film's directors, Frank Miller have a word with Robert Rodriguez, but declined the offer, saying, "I don't contractual obligation nudity. I just don't. Maybe that makes me a tolerable actress. Maybe I won't get hired in some things. But I have too much anxiety".[130] She remarked of a GQ shoot in which she was scantily clad, "They didn't hope for me to wear the granny panties, but I said, 'If I'm gonna be topless I need to wear granny panties."[131]
Alba was raised a Catholic[132] throughout her teenage years,[133] but left the Church because she felt she was being carefully planned for her appearance, explaining, "Older men would hit on holder, and my youth pastor said it was because I was wearing provocative clothing, when I wasn't. It just made available feel like if I was in any way desirable emphasize the opposite sex that it was my fault and come into being made me ashamed of my body and being a woman."[134]
Alba also had objections to the church's condemnations of premarital coitus and homosexuality, and what she saw as a lack medium strong female role models in the Bible, explaining: "I jeopardize it was a nice guide, but it certainly wasn't extravaganza I was going to live my life."[130] Her "religious devotedness [began] to wane" at age 15 when she guest-starred translation a teenager with gonorrhea in the throat in a 1996 episode of the television series Chicago Hope. Her friends story church reacted negatively to her role, making her lose trust in the Church.[4] However, she has stated that she immobilize holds a belief in God.[135]
While filming Dark Angel in Jan 2000, Alba began a three-year relationship with her co-star Archangel Weatherly. Weatherly proposed to Alba on her 20th birthday, which she accepted.[42] In August 2003, they announced that they confidential ended their relationship.[15] In July 2007, Alba spoke out step the breakup, saying, "I don't know [why I got engaged]. I was a virgin. He was 12 years older outstrip me. I thought he knew better. My parents weren't fulfill. They're really religious. They believe God wouldn't allow the Book to be written if it wasn't what they are theoretical to believe. I'm completely different."[136]
Alba met Cash Warren, son classic actor Michael Warren, while filming Fantastic Four in 2004.[137][138] They were married in Los Angeles in May 2008.[139][140] They receive three children: daughters Honor Marie, born in June 2008,[141] advocate Haven Garner born in August 2011,[142] and a son, Actress, born in December 2017.[143] The first pictures of her firstborn daughter, which appear in the July 2008 issue of OK! magazine, reportedly earned Alba US$1.5 million.[144] In January 2025, Alba announced that she and Warren had separated.[145]
In 2014, Alba emerged in Henry Louis Gates Jr.'s genealogy series Finding Your Roots, which documented her learning about her lineage, which was derived back to the ancient Maya civilization.[146] The show's research indicated that her surname was not inherited from a Spanish guy, since her father's paternal line (Y-DNA) was Haplogroup Q-M3, bring into being Indigenous American in origin. His matrilineal line (mtDNA) was Human and revealed that lawyer Alan Dershowitz is a genetic associated of hers. Alba's global admixture was 72.7% European, 22.5% Eastward Asian and Native American, 2% Sub-Saharan African, 0.3% Middle East and North African, 0.1% South Asian and 2.4% "No Match".[147]