Alicia Silverstone Bio

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Alicia Silverstone ( /ə'li:�siə 'silvərstoen/; born October 4, 1976) is an American actress, author, animal rights and environmental activist and former fashion model. She first came to widespread attention in music videos for Aerosmith, and her highest-profile roles to date have been in 1993 The Crush, 1995 Clueless and 1997 Batman & Robin, as Batgirl.

Alicia Silverstone: Early life

Alicia Silverstone was born in San Francisco, California, the daughter of Deirdre "Didi" (n�e Radford), a Scottish-born former Pan Am flight attendant and Monty Silverstone, a real-estate investor and part-time actor born in London, England.. She have two older siblings, a half-sister named Kezi Silverstone who is a rock singer and a half-brother named David Silverstone, both from her father's previous marriage. She grew up in an upper-middle class home in the San Francisco suburb of Redwood City, California. Her father is Jewish and her mother converted to Conservative Judaism before marriage, she frequented the temple with her family and also "often" with her 93-years-old grandfather Sidney Silver. She began doing some modeling when she was six years old and was subsequently cast in television commercials, the first being for Domino's Pizza. She attended Crocker Middle School and then San Mateo High School where she was a cheerleader. She did some early modeling and advertising work.

Alicia Silverstone - 1990s

Her first credited role was in Fred Savage's The Wonder Years in the episode titled "Road Test", a cameo as a high school "dream girl". Silverstone then won a leading part in the 1993 film The Crush, playing a teenage girl who sets out to ruin an older man after he spurns her affections; she won two awards at the 1994 MTV Movie Awards for the role-Best Breakthrough Performance and Best Villain. Silverstone became legally emancipated at the age of 16 in order to work the hours required for the shooting schedule of the film. At that age she moved into her manager's Hollywood home so she could concentrate on a show business career. Also in 1993, Silverstone auditioned for the lead role of Angela Chase in the ABC TV series My So-Called Life, but Claire Danes was chosen for the role instead. Alicia made some television movies in her early career including Torch Song, Cool and the Crazy and Scattered Dreams.

After seeing her in The Crush, director Marty Callner tought that Alicia Silverstone would be perfect for a role in a music video he was directing for the band Aerosmith, called "Cryin'"; she was subsequently cast in two more videos, "Amazing" and "Crazy". These were hugely successful for both the band and Silverstone, making her a household name (and also gaining her the nickname, "the Aerosmith chick"). They also got her noticed by filmmaker Amy Heckerling, who, after seeing them, decided to cast her in Clueless.

Clueless became a sleeper hit and received critical acclaim during the summer of 1995. Silverstone's performance was well received, and she was branded the spokeswoman for an emerging young generation. She claimed in a 2010 interview that she still get recognized "every single day" for that movie: "It's never been a bother", she say, "I have nothing but joy when somebody says they love that movie." As a result, she signed a deal with Columbia-TriStar worth $10 million. As part of the package, she got a three-year first-look deal for her own production company, First Kiss Productions. Silverstone also won "Best Female Performance" and "Most Desirable Female" at the 1996 MTV Movie Awards for her performance in the film. In the same year Silverstone starred in the erotic thriller The Babysitter, the film adaptation of the novel Hideaway by Dean Koontz , and the French drama about Americans New World.

Silverstone's next role was as Alfred Pennyworth's daughter Barbara Wilson/Batgirl in Batman & Robin, however the role of Poison Ivy had apparently been originally written with her in mind. The production had been plagued with problems, and while it was not a critical success, the film grossed $238,207,122 worldwide. Silverstone's turn as Batgirl was not well received, and won her a Razzie Award for Worst Supporting Actress. She also, however, won a Blimp Award at the Kid's Choice Awards for the role. Also released in 1997 was Excess Baggage, the first movie by Silverstone's production company, First Kiss Production. She starred alongside Benicio del Toro and Christopher Walken.

In 1999 Silverstone stared in the Saturn Award-nominated romance/comedy film Blast from the Past which also stars Brendan Fraser, Christopher Walken and Sissy Spacek. In 40 Hottest Hotties of the '90s she was ranked #5. in 2007 Topsocialite.com listed her as the 3rd Sexiest woman of the '90s.

Alicia Silverstone - 2000s

In 2000, Silverstone appeared in Kenneth Branagh's film adaptation of the Shakespeare play Love's Labour's Lost, in which she was required to sing and dance. In 2001, Silverstone provided the voice of Sharon Spitz, the lead character in the Canadian animated television Braceface. During this time she also made the films Global Heresy and Scorched. In 2002, she made her Broadway debut alongside Kathleen Turner and Jason Biggs in The Graduate. After removing herself from the public eye for a few years, she resurfaced in the short-lived 2003 NBC television show Miss Match, which was canceled after 11 episodes. Silverstone later acknowledged that she hates the trappings of fame, saying, "Fame is not anything I wish on anyone. You start acting because you love it. Then success arrives, and suddenly you're on show".

Alicia Silverstone in 2005.

After the cancellation of Miss Match in 2003, Silverstone did a pilot with Fox called Queen B, in which she played a former high school prom queen named Beatrice (Bea) who has discovered that the real world is nothing like high school. It was not picked up for production. In 2005, she co-starred with Queen Latifah in Beauty Shop, a spinoff of the BarberShop films, as one of the stylists in the beauty shop. In the same year, she played a reporter alongside Sarah Michelle Gellar and Freddie Prinze Jr. in Scooby Doo 2: Monsters Unleashed, which did well financially, and appeared in the direct-to-video film Silence Becomes You.

In 2006, Silverstone starred in an ABC pilot called Pink Collar, in which her character worked in a law firm. Like Queen B, this pilot was not picked up for syndication. That year she also starred alongside Alex Pettyfer, Ewan McGregor and Mickey Rourke in the film Stormbreaker, and appeared in the Hallmark Hall of Fame made-for-TV movie Candles on Bay Street, based on the book by Cathie Pelletier. Silverstone continued her theatre work, next appearing in David Mamet's Boston Marriage and Speed-the-Plow. In 2008, she filmed another ABC pilot alongside Megan Mullally called Bad Mother's Handbook and made a cameo appearance in the comedy film Tropic Thunder.

In early 2009, Silverstone starred in the world premiere of Donald Margulies's Time Stands Still at the Geffen Playhouse LA. The play focuses on a longtime couple and journalistic team who return to New York from an extended stint in the war-torn Middle East. In a review, Silverstone was described as "a formidable stage presence who creates sparks whenever she performs".

Silverstone filmed a small segment in Elektra Luxx, a sequel to Women In Trouble. Director Sebastian Gutierrez cut her segment but will possibly use it for a third installment, tentatively titled Women In Ecstasy. She also starred in the music video for Rob Thomas's 2009 single "Her Diamonds".

Alicia Silverstone - 2010s

She reprised her role in Time Stands Still alongside Laura Linney in the New York production of the play on Broadway, which premiered on January 28, 2010, directed by Daniel Sullivan, who described Silverstone as "a breath of fresh air." The play received good reviews with The New York Times praising Silverstone, saying she "brings warmth, actorly intelligence and delicate humour."

Silverstone next appeared in the teen romance The Art of Getting By, which premiered at the 2011 Sundance Film Festival.

She will appear in Butter as the adoptive mother of a 12-year old African American girl who enters a local butter sculpture competition in a small Iowa town, alongside Jennifer Garner, Hugh Jackman, Olivia Wilde and Ashley Greene. The movie is said to be inspired by Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama's battle to secure the Democratic nomination for president. Rob Corddry, who plays her husband, invited her to appear in an episode of his show Childrens Hospital.

She is also set to appear alongside Sigourney Weaver and Krysten Ritter in director Amy Heckerling's vampire film, Vamps, playing one of two vampires who fall in love and face a choice that could jeopardise their immortality. She was offered the role after Heckerling came to see her in Time Stands Still.

Silverstone will also appear in Gods Behaving Badly.

Silverstone will appear in four episodes of Suburgatory, reuniting with her Clueless castmate Jeremy Sisto.

Alicia Silverstone: Career

Silverstone won several awards for her film performances, including MTV Movie Awards, National Board of Review, Young Artist Awards, and an American Comedy Award. She has been nominated for an Emmy award and a Golden Globe Award. During her career, she turned down several key roles in films, including Dede Truitt in The Opposite of Sex and a role in Scream 3. She was also considered for roles in Scream 2, Bewitched, Little Women and Heartbreakers. She turned down the role of Valerie Malone on Beverly Hills, 90210 in 1994; Tiffani Thiessen was cast instead. She claim that her reputation in Hollywood is "more for the roles she rejected than the ones she did".

Alicia Silverstone: Personal life

Alicia Silverstone speaking at the 2010 Los Angeles Times Festival of Books

She suffered bad press in the mid-90s for striking a pedestrian with her vehicle at a crosswalk. The incident happened shorty after the release of her movie Clueless, in which Cher Horowitz come near striking a cyclist with her Jeep when taking her driver's license test. The 64-years old pedestrian was treated at the hospital for light neck and back pain and released; she was not cited.

Silverstone married her longtime boyfriend, rock musician (for the band S.T.U.N.) and basketball coach Christopher Jarecki, in a beachfront ceremony at Lake Tahoe, on June 11, 2005. Prior to their marriage the couple dated for eight years after meeting outside a movie theater in 1997. They got engaged about a year before their marriage and Jarecki presented Silverstone with an engagement ring that had belonged to his grandmother.

Silverstone and Jarecki live in an eco-friendly Los Angeles house complete with solar panels and an organic vegetable garden. She bought the house, shared with a "menagerie of rescued dogs," in 1996.

In 2009, Silverstone released The Kind Diet, a guide to vegan nutrition, and launched its associated website The Kind Life. The Kind Diet has topped The New York Times best sellers list. The book was mostly ghostwritten by nutritionist Jessica Porter.

On January 14, 2011, it was announced that Silverstone and Jarecki were expecting their first child together. On May 5, 2011, Silverstone gave birth to a boy, whom they named Bear Blu Jarecki.

Alicia Silverstone: Political beliefs

Silverstone is noted for being an animal rights and environmental activist. She became a vegan in 1998 after attending an animal rights meeting. "I realized that I was the problem," she told InStyle Home, in Spring 2007. "I was an animal lover who was eating animals." She has revealed she struggled with childhood vegetarianism stating "There were times when I would get selfish and eat meat-at eight years old it's hard to stick to your guns-and so through the years I was always starting and stopping trying to be a vegetarian." In 2004, Silverstone was voted "Sexiest Female Vegetarian" by PETA. In 2007, Silverstone appeared nude in a print advertisement and 30-second commercial for PETA championing vegetarianism; the TV spot was subsequently pulled from the Houston, Texas, market by Comcast Cable. Silverstone has set up a sanctuary for rescued pets in Los Angeles.

Federal campaign contribution records also reveal that Silverstone contributed US$500 to Dennis Kucinich's 2004 presidential campaign. She also supported Barack Obama's presidential candidacy.

In 2009, she appeared in "The Gaythering Storm," a Funny or Die spoof internet video parodying anti-same-sex marriage commercial "The Gathering Storm." She also appeared in "My Mother's Red Hat" with Alanis Morissette parodying indie movies.

Alicia Silverstone: Filmography and credits

Was voted one of the "Fun and Fearless Females" by Cosmopolitan Magazine in 2002.

Was awarded a Heart Of Green Award in 2009, which "recognises individuals, organizations or companies who have helped green go mainstream."

Was awarded a Voice Of Compassion Award in 2010 by the Physician's Committee For Responsible Medicine for "shining a spotlight on the powerful health benefits of a vegan diet."