Katherine Heigl
Birth name	Katherine Marie Heigl
Born	November 24 1978 (1978--) (age 30) Washington, D.C., U.S.
Died
Awards Emmy Awards Outstanding Supporting Actress - Drama Series 2007 Grey's Anatomy Golden Globe Awards Nominated: 2006 Grey's Anatomy Screen Actors Guild Awards Best Ensemble - Drama Series 2006 Grey's Anatomy

Katherine Marie Heigl (born November 24, 1978) is an Emmy-winning and Golden Globe-nominated American actress and former fashion model.

Biography

Early life

Heigl was born in Washington, D.C. to Paul Heigl, a financial executive/accountant, and Nancy, a personal manager.^[1] She has German and Irish ancestry^[2] and was raised a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.^[3][4] She had a strict upbringing.^[5] She is the youngest of four children (in addition to siblings Meg (who is adopted), Jason and John (Holt) Heigl). Heigl lived in Virginia and then Denver before her family settled in Connecticut, where they moved into a large, old Victorian-style farmhouse in the wealthy town of New Canaan, where she spent most of her childhood.

In 1986, her 15-year-old older brother Jason died of injuries suffered in a car accident, after being thrown from the back of a pickup truck. When doctors determined he was brain-dead following an eight-hour operation, the family decided to donate his organs. The Heigl family was never in any doubt that Jason would have wanted his organs and tissues donated for transplant.^[6] Heigl is now a strong proponent of organ donation.^[7]

Career

When Heigl was nine, an aunt visiting the family decided to take a number of photographs of her. After returning to her home in New York, the aunt sent the photos to a number of modeling agencies, with the permission of Heigl's parents. Within a few weeks, Heigl was signed as a child model. Almost immediately, a client slated Heigl for use in a magazine advertisement where she made her debut. She was soon earning $75 an hour posing for Sears and Lord & Taylor catalogs. Television jobs soon followed, the first in a national spot for Cheerios cereal. She made her acting debut in the 1992 movie That Night. Heigl appeared as Christina Sebastian in Steven Soderbergh's Depression-era drama King of the Hill before being cast in her first leading role in the 1994 comedy My Father the Hero. During this time, Heigl continued to attend New Canaan High School, balancing her film and modeling work with her academic studies.

She then appeared opposite Steven Seagal in the 1995 action thriller . Despite an increased focus on acting, she still modeled extensively, appearing regularly in magazines such as Seventeen. She took the lead role in Disney's made-for-television film Wish Upon a Star in 1996. Also in 1996, Heigl's parents divorced and her mother was diagnosed with cancer.^[5] After her high school graduation in 1997, she moved with her mother into a four-bedroom house in Malibu Canyon, Los Angeles, and her mother became her manager.

In 1998, she co-starred with Peter Fonda in a re-working of the classic Shakespearian play The Tempest, set during the American Civil War. Later that year, she starred in the horror film Bride of Chucky.

In 1999, Heigl turned her attention to television when she accepted the role of Isabel Evans on the science fiction TV drama Roswell, a role that was expanded in the show's second and third seasons. Heigl was frequently featured in photo essays in magazines such as Life, TV Guide, and Teen as well as FHM. She appeared in the FHM and Maxim calendars, FHM's annual "100 Sexiest Women in the World", and was featured in the Girls of Maxim Gallery.^[8]In May 2006, Maxim awarded her #12 on their annual Hot 100^[9] List as well as voted the 19th "Sexiest Woman in the World" by readers of FHM magazine. While Roswell was in production, Heigl worked on several films, including 100 Girls, an independent 2001 film, and Valentine, a horror film starring David Boreanaz and Denise Richards.

Heigl accepted a role in Ground Zero, a television thriller scheduled to be telecast that fall which was based on the bestselling James Mills novel The Seventh Power, in the spring of 2001. She co-starred as a brilliant and politically-concerned college student who helps to build a nuclear device to illustrate the need for a change in national priorities; the device ends up in the hands of a terrorist following betrayal by a fellow student. After the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, however, the film was shelved when its plot was considered inappropriate; it re-emerged in 2003 under the title Critical Assembly. After the attacks, Heigl recorded a public service announcement for the American Red Cross in an effort to help raise money for victims.

In 2003, Heigl appeared in three television movies. She returned to the horror genre with Evil Never Dies, a modern-day variation on the Frankenstein story co-starring Thomas Gibson. Love Comes Softly, for Hallmark Entertainment, found Heigl starring as Marty Claridge, a young, pregnant newlywed traveling west. (She reprised the role of Marty in the sequel Love's Enduring Promise the next year.) Heigl played Isabella Linton in MTV's modern revamp of Emily Brontë's Wuthering Heights. In October 2003, Heigl was cast opposite Johnny Knoxville in The Ringer, a Farrelly brothers comedy that was released in December 2005. Heigl starred as Romy in the 2005 television movie , a prequel to the 1997 film Romy and Michele's High School Reunion.

In 2005, Heigl was cast in what would become her most high-profile role, as intern Dr. Isobel "Izzie" Stevens on Grey's Anatomy, an ABC medical drama. The show, originally introduced as a midseason replacement, has become a huge ratings success. The same year, Heigl landed the starring role in the independent film Side Effects,^[10] about marketing and the pharmaceutical industry. In late 2006, Heigl was nominated for a Golden Globe award in the category, Best Supporting Actress in a Series, Mini-series, or Motion Picture Made for Television for her work on Grey's Anatomy. Also in 2006, she filmed Knocked Up, a comedy from writer/director Judd Apatow, starring opposite Seth Rogen. Upon its June 2007 theatrical release, the film received largely positive reviews from critics, and proved to be a box office success.

She has been on FHM's "100 Sexiest Women in the World" list twice as of 2007.

On September 16, 2007, Heigl won an Emmy for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Drama Series for her role as Izzie Stevens. In her acceptance speech she acknowledged that even her mother did not believe she would win, and when her name was called, had to be censored vocally by the telecast's producers, due to her saying "Shit!" when she reacted to the win.^[11] Earlier, she had corrected telecast announcer Rebecca Riedy, who had been given an incorrect phonetic spelling of Heigl's name, when she mispronounced her name as Hi-gell before the presentation of the award with Kyle Chandler for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Miniseries or Movie.

Personal life

Heigl was previously in a relationship with actor Jason Behr.^[12] In June 2006, she became engaged to singer Josh Kelley, whom she met on the set of his music video for "Only You."^[13] In June 2007, she announced that a wedding date has been set. The couple will marry in October 2007.^[14]

Filmography

Year	Title	Role	Notes
1992	That Night	Kathryn
1993	King of the Hill	Christina Sebastian
1994	My Father the Hero	Nicole
1995		Sarah Ryback
1996	Wish Upon a Star	Alexia Wheaton	made-for-television
1997	Prince Valiant	Princess Ilene
	Stand-ins	Taffy-Rita Hayworth's Stand-in
1998	Bug Buster	Shannon Griffin
	Bride of Chucky	Jade
	The Tempest	Miranda Prosper	made-for-television
1999	Roswell	Isabel Evans	1999-2002
2000	100 Girls	Arlene
2001	Valentine	Shelley Fisher
2003	Love Comes Softly	Marty Claridge	made-for-television
	Wuthering Heights	Isabel Linton	made-for-television
2004	Love's Enduring Promise	Marty Claridge	made-for-television
2005		Romy White	made-for-television
	Side Effects	Karly Hert
	The Ringer	Lynn Sheridan
	Grey's Anatomy	Dr. Isobel "Izzie" Stevens	2005-present
2006	Zyzzyx Road	Marissa
	Caffeine	Laura
2007	Knocked Up	Alison Scott
2008	27 Dresses	Jane

Awards

Awards
Primetime Emmy Awards
Preceded by Blythe Danner for Huff	Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Drama Series for Grey's Anatomy 2007	Succeeded by Incumbent

References

External links

• Katherine Heigl at the Internet Movie Database
• Katherine Heigl at Yahoo! Movies
• Katherine Heigl at TV.com
• Katherine Heigl at People.com
• Collection of interviews