Brittany Murphy

Capable of drawing people's attention through her versatility in portraying various human characters on-screen apart from her unusual beauty, Brittany Anne Murphy indeed is one great young talent Hollywood should be proud to have of. A petite yet energetic performer of Italian, Eastern European, and Irish descent, Britt, so she is usually called, was born as the only child of Angelo Bertolotti and Sharon Murphy on November 10, 1977 in Atlanta, Georgia. Her name originally was Sharon Bertolotti, but she later changed it to her current name upon cutting ties with her father who had left the family since his divorce in late 1970s. Raised solely by her mother, the girl spent her early life in Edison, New Jersey where she persistently developed her acting skills in regional theater while attending Herbert Hoover School to then earn appearances in local stage productions of "Les Miserables" and "Really Rosie" at age 9.

Afterwards followed her mother moving to Burbank, California in 1991, where Britt's career in show business began to advance in good pace as for the next few years she wonderfully managed to gain parts in a handful of TV series, like "Drexell's Class" (1991-1992), "Blossom" (1993), also "Sister, Sister" (1994-1995). With this experience, she thus smoothly made transition to big screen feature, securing a supporting role in Amy Heckerling's 1995 effort of "Clueless" alongside Alicia Silverstone, Paul Rudd, plus Breckin Meyer. Beyond expectation, the teen flick surprisingly turned out to be a sleeper hit of that year when it amazingly soared to collect over 56 million U.S. dollar in the box-office, without doubt elevated the striking brunette to vast attention around the country right away which positively provided her larger chance to gain more prominence in the field.

Consequently became a hot commodity in Hollywood, Britt confidently moved on her path to star in numerous screen projects either small or big ones for the rest of the '90s, most notably that of "Girl, Interrupted" (1999) which allowed this alumna of John Burroughs High School to share the critics' huge praise it garnered to shine brighter in the industry. The profile delightfully was further enhanced by her subsequent roles in high-profile movies of "Don't Say a Word" (2001), "8 Mile" (2002), also "Just Married" (2003) when all of them proved to be box-office success both in the States and abroad. Next seen in "Little Black Book" (2004) then "Sin City" (2005), everything seems to run quite well on the track for her as she has already been attached to at least 6 pictures for 2006 and 2007 releases, including those of "Love and Other Disasters" (2006), "The Groomsmen" (2006), plus "Sin City 2" (2007).

Film career aside, Britt also has been known to have established love relationship with several handsome guys in her life, the first being the late Jonathan Brandis of "SeaQuest DSV" fame whom she once dated in 1995. Later spotted romancing Ashton Kutcher in 2002 as a result of their togetherness while filming "Just Married," the brown-eyed beauty again was left alone when the knot had to end by the following year yet she did not wait long to flourish another love, this time in a talent manager named Jeffrey Evan Kwatinetz. This too only lasted briefly for the twosome shockingly decided to split in May 2004 even though they had engaged since January the same year. However, love once again worked its magic on her upon bumping into production assistant Joe Macaluso on the set of "Little Black Book" to then see the actress happily announced her second engagement in December 2005. Sad to say that while her acting career keeps on rocketing, her love life unfortunately doesn't work well. In August 2006, the actress publicly announced her split from Joe, released a statement through her representative saying "Brittany Murphy and Joe Macaluso have amicably ended their engagement. They remain close friends and wish each other much happiness." Found a new love in Simon Monjack, a British writer and director, they secretly got married in 2007 at their home in Los Angeles surrounded by their families.