Kelly Ripa Bio

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Kelly Ripa Pictures

Kelly Ripa (born October 2, 1970) is an American actress and television host. Since February 2001, she has served as the co-host of talk show Live with Regis and Kelly, along with Regis Philbin and now solo host of Live! With Kelly. Earlier in her career, Ripa played Hayley Vaughan for twelve years (1990-2002) on the television soap opera All My Children (1970-2011); she also played Faith Fairfield on the television situation comedy Hope & Faith (2003-2006). Both television series were on the ABC network.

Kelly Ripa: Early life and education

She was born Kelly Maria Ripa in Stratford, New Jersey, the daughter of Esther, a homemaker, and Joseph Ripa, a labor-union president and bus driver. She has a younger sister, Linda Ripa, who is a children's author. Her father has been the Democratic County Clerk for Camden County, New Jersey, since June 2009. She is three-quarters Italian descent and one-quarter Irish.

Ripa went to Berlin Community School in Berlin, New Jersey, later attending Eastern High School in Voorhees Township, New Jersey.

She performed in high school plays and was discovered while performing in the comedy play The Ugly Duckling (c. 1941), by A.A. Milne, during her senior year of high school.

Kelly Ripa: Career

Ripa's first television exposure came when she appeared as a regular dancer first in a local Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, dance party show, Dancin' On Air. Later she appeared on the USA Network afternoon show, Dance Party USA. She was cast in her first major acting role in 1990, as Hayley Vaughan on All My Children.

In 2001, she appeared on a celebrity version of Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?, hosted by Philbin. She won $250,000 for charity. Later that year, Ripa appeared as a guest host on the long-running talk show Live with Regis and Kathie Lee. She was soon selected to co-host the program, replacing Kathie Lee Gifford. After Ripa was hired as the new co-host, the show's title was changed to Live with Regis and Kelly. She continued to appear on both Live and All My Children during her first year as co-host, choosing to leave the soap opera in 2002.

In September 2003, she was back on double duty, when she co-starred (with Faith Ford) on Hope & Faith. She portrayed Faith Fairfield, a former soap-opera star whose character moves in with (and subsequently wreaks havoc on) her sister Hope's family, after her soap-opera character is killed off. Hope & Faith ran for three seasons, before a ratings decline led to its cancellation.

Ripa talks to the audience during a taping of Live with Regis and Kelly.

In June 2004, Ripa agreed to continue as Live co-host for at least five more years, at a salary that the tabloid-television show Extra reported was $8 million a year. In October 2006, The Hollywood Reporter reported that Ripa and her husband Mark Consuelos, also an actor, were partnering with producers from Hope & Faith on a sitcom for The CW Television Network that would be loosely based on the couple's experiences as soap-opera actors.

On November 17, 2006, singer-songwriter Clay Aiken substituted for Philbin on Live. During an interview, Aiken covered Ripa's mouth with his hand. The incident drew considerable media reaction after Ripa complained at length about the incident on her show the following Monday.

In April 2007, Ripa hosted the 2007 TV Land Awards. In May 2007, Ripa stated that she most likely is done with acting for the time being.

In 2009, Ripa appeared on the PBS children's series, The Electric Company, in the role of "Wednesday Jones," a private investigator.

On April 2, 2009, the TLC network announced that they picked up two shows developed Milojo Productions, Ripa's and Consuelos's production company. They will executive produce Mom Inc. and Eat, Drink and Be Married. Ripa will star in Mom, Inc. as the host.

On October 16, 2009, Ripa and Consuelos returned to All My Children for two episodes for the soap opera's 40th-year anniversary, on January 4-5, 2010.

Kelly Ripa: Awards

Ripa won five Soap Opera Digest Awards for playing Vaughn on All My Children in 1996, 1998, and 2000. She has been nominated for eight Daytime Emmy Awards. Three of these nominations were for playing Vaughn and five were for her work co-hosting Live.

Ripa on the set of Live with Regis and Kelly

On April 23, 2006, she won a Daytime Emmy Award for Outstanding Special Class Special for co-hosting the 2005 Walt Disney World Christmas Day Parade, along with co-hosts Philbin and Ryan Seacrest.

On September 15, 2006, Ripa broke the Guinness World Record as twenty-four banana-cream pies were tossed at her mouth in one minute, as part of a Guinness World Record Breaker theme week on Live with Regis and Kelly. She beat the record set by NASCAR driver Matt Kenseth on the previous day, when he threw seventeen pies at Ripa herself. On September 16, 2011, Ripa broke the Guinness World Record for Most Grapes Trodden in 1 Minute, of 5.4 litres, as she extracted 8.4 litres. However, the previous record holder, Martina Servaty of Germany, was also competing at the same time and extracted even more (8.6 litres), preventing Ripa from holding the new record.

On June 19, 2011, Ripa and Philbin won a Daytime Emmy Award for, "Outstanding Talkshow Host."

She also appeared on the television show, Hannah Montana Forever.

Kelly Ripa: In popular culture

Cowboy Mouth, a New Orleans, Louisiana-based rock band, wrote a song in tribute titled Kelly Ripa that appeared on its album, Fearless (2008). It performed the song on Live with Regis and Kelly on March 13, 2008.

Kelly Ripa: Charity Work

In between her busy schedule of co-hosting the morning television show, "Live! With Kelly," and taking care of her family, Kelly Ripa hosts a charity event in the Hamptons, on Long Island, New York. Ripa joins in hosting the "Super Saturday Benefit" along with Emma Roberts, Donna Karan and Kim Kardashian, "InStyle" magazine and its' editor in-chief, Ariel Foxman, during the last weekend of July, every year. "Super Saturday" is an annual fundraiser and fashion sale, held in a huge field in Southhampton where close to 200 famous fashion designers set-up tables and donate their surplus - whatever they did not sell that year. The purpose of this charity event is to support and create awareness for ovarian cancer research. All net proceeds collected from the sales of clothing and the various activities for the family, such as a carnival, raffle, fortuneteller and spa treatments go the "Ovarian Cancer Research Fund." The fund, "is devoted to early diagnostic treatment programs and research toward the conquest of ovarian cancer." Ripa decided to participate in this benefit because someone she knew contracted the disease. As the OCRF's signature event, "Super Saturday" been very successful, raising approximately $3.6 million in the summer of 2009. To express her excitement, Ripa tweeted, "Whoop! ! Everything is sold out! Way to go #OCRF." She shows her support by hosting this event and ensures that others do too by advertising on her daily talk show and through social-networking websites.