Alicia Silverstone
Alicia Silverstone (born
October 4,
1976) is an
American actress and former fashion model. She first came to widespread attention in
music videos for
Aerosmith and later starred in
Hollywood films such as
Clueless and
Batman & Robin.
Early life
Silverstone was born in
San Francisco, California, to Monty Silverstone, a
British-born real-estate investor, and Didi Radford, a
Scottish-born former flight attendant who converted to
Judaism upon marrying Silverstone's father. She was raised in
Hillsborough, California. Alicia is the youngest of Monty and Didi's three children but she also has a half-sister, London rock singer Kezi Silverstone, and a half-brother, David Silverstone, from Monty's previous marriage. When Alicia was six, Monty took some photos of his young daughter. The photos allowed her to get some modeling gigs which then led to television commercials (the first being for
Domino's Pizza).
Alicia later attended
San Mateo High School in
San Mateo, California where she was a cheerleader. During this time she acquired some early
modelling and
advertising work and eventually got the part of the 'dream girl' on American TV series
The Wonder Years.''
Acting career
She won a leading part in the
1993 movie
The Crush, playing a girl who sets out to ruin an older man after her teenage crush is spurned, for which she won two awards at the
1994 MTV Movie Awards. Silverstone actually became legally emancipated at the age of 15 in order to work the hours required for the shooting schedule of
The Crush.
She went on to star in three
Aerosmith music videos, entitled "Cryin," "Crazy," and "Amazing," which were hugely successful both for the band and Silverstone, making her a household name (and also the nickname, "the Aerosmith chick"). Around this period, Silverstone was offered the role of Valerie Malone, on
Beverly Hills 90210. After she turned it down, the role went to
Tiffani Thiessen.
After
Clueless became a huge sleeper hit and critical darling during the summer of
1995, Silverstone was hailed as the woman of the hour, and branded the spokeswoman for an emerging young generation. As a result, she was able to sign 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.
The first movie to be released by
First Kiss Productions was a
1997 dark comedy called
Excess Baggage.
Excess Baggage, a movie in which Silverstone played a
chain smoking,
underage drinking, rich brat, who fakes her own kidnapping in order to get her father's attention, was not as critically or commercially embraced as
Clueless. Silverstone also came under fire (especially by
E!) for receiving such a lucrative production deal so early in her career.
Excess Baggage was such a disappointment, that after just one film, Columbia-TriStar quietly let their production deal with Silverstone expire.
Around the time she was featured as
Batgirl in
Batman & Robin, Silverstone was lambasted by tabloid media and mainstream press alike for putting on weight. Though hardly obese by any standard, Silverstone had obviously put on more weight than the public was used to seeing her carry, and this started a whirlwind of rumors that affected her personal life. Coincidentally, she was turned down for the lead in
1994's
My Father the Hero because the producers said that she was too heavy for the part. The role ultimately went to
Katherine Heigl instead. She suffered further bad press for allegedly striking a pedestrian with her vehicle in a crosswalk [
1]; and it didn't help Silverstone's cause that
Batman & Robin was an even bigger critical and commercial failure than her other movie from 1997,
Excess Baggage.
Apparently,
Sony was hoping that after a potential blockbuster like
Batman & Robin, Silverstone would be bankable at the box office. But when the performance of
Batman & Robin proved to be disappointing, they lost faith in her and pretty much dumped
Excess Baggage with very little promotion or marketing. After her production deal ended, very few people would hire her.
For some time, Silverstone, despite her young age, gained the reputation of being a "has been", who reached her peak with the Aerosmith videos and
Clueless. She effectively removed herself from the public eye for many years, resurfacing in the critically acclaimed
NBC television show
Miss Match, which was cancelled after thirteen episodes in fall
2003. This long hiatus was referred to in the pilot episode of the television series
Get Real, as an exasperated Kenny remarked,
"Why can't I fall off the face of the earth, like Alicia Silverstone?"Silverstone later acknowledged that she hates the trappings of fame, insisting that being a celebrity is a horrific ordeal that she wouldn't want her worst enemy to suffer. According to Silverstone
"Fame is not anything I wish on anyone. You start acting because you love it. Then success arrives, and suddenly you're on show."[
2]
Silverstone reportedly refuses to appear nude in any of her movies. Because of this, she requires a body double in her place for nude scenes. When she starred in the stage version of
The Graduate, she insisted on wearing underwear for the famous nude-scene. The producers were forced to let her do this because, otherwise, she would have resigned from the show.
She has also acted in the
Kenneth Branagh film adaptation of the
Shakespeare play
Love's Labour's Lost, in which she was required to sing and dance.
After the cancellation of
Miss Match in
2005, she scored a pilot with
FOX called
Queen B, in which she would've played a former high school prom queen named Beatriz (Bea), who has found out that the real world is nothing like high school. For the pilot season of
2006-
2007, she surfaced on pilot being developed by
ABC called
Pink Collar, in which she would've worked in a law firm.
Personal life
Silverstone married her longtime boyfriend
Christopher Jarecki, lead singer of the band
S.T.U.N., in a beachfront ceremony at
Lake Tahoe on
June 11,
2005. The couple dated for eight years prior to being married.
She is also noted for her strong views on
animal welfare and is a committed
vegan. In
2004, Silverstone was voted sexiest female vegetarian by
PETA[
3]. In another illustration of her activism, Alicia recently went to the South Central Farm in LA to support the community. Listen:
She is bilingual, fluent in
English and
French.
Silverstone has also hinted several times that she has either been or would like to be romantically involved with other women. Reportedly, when she was recently in
Australia, she said she saw an extremely beautiful waitress in a resturant, and wrote a letter commenting on the womans beauty.[
4]
*Won "Best Female Performance" and "Most Desirable Female" by the
MTV Movie Awards in 1996 for her performance in
Clueless (1995).
*In an interview with
FHM in the January 2000 issue, she denied that she is dating Kenneth Branagh, which she reaffirmed on BBC Radio 1 on April 6 of that year.
*Was offered the role of Valerie Malone, on
Beverly Hills, 90210 (1990). Since it was the beginning of her career, Alicia turned it down, and
Tiffani Thiessen got the role instead (1994).
*Dated
Adam Sandler*Born at 3:44 p.m.-PDT
*Voted sexiest female vegetarian by
PETA online survey, 2004.[
5]
*Got a surprise grab-and-smooch by
Jim Carrey at the
1997 MTV Movie Awards when she presented the "Best Comedic Performance" award to Carrey. Carrey apologized to her backstage after realizing that she felt very humiliated.
*
Alicia Silverstone: Interview
