Christine Joan Taylor was born on July 30, 1971, in Allentown, Pennsylvania, and grew up in nearby Macungie. She has one brother, Brian Taylor. She was interested in acting from her earliest years and appeared in stage productions at the age of three, but spent the latter part of her childhood and early teens concentrating on schoolwork while studying at the strict Allentown Central Catholic High School. Upon graduating, she won a role as a lifeguard in ranch-based TV show Hey Dude, alongside David Brisbin and Kelly Brown. Taylor stayed with the show for two years, moving to Los Angeles to make work easier. There she landed parts in Dallas, with Larry Hagman and Patrick Duffy; Saved by the Bell, with Mario Lopez and Dustin Diamond; and Blossom, with Mayim Bialik. Taylor also did theater work, and it was through this that she first came to be involved with The Brady Bunch, playing Martha in a theatrical adaptation of the popular TV show.
Taylor's first film role came in 1993 with Calendar Girl, in which she starred alongside Jason Priestley and Joe Pantoliano. She went on to make Showdown, with Billy Blanks and Kenn Scott, and Night of the Demons 2, with Cristi Harris and Darin Heames, a sequel to Kevin Tenney's cult favorite which reportedly helped her to get over her fears after being the victim of a carjacking. Taylor also worked in television, making notable appearances on TV shows Ellen, Caroline in the City, Seinfeld, and Friends.
In 1995, Taylor shot to stardom by reprising her performance as Martha Brady in big screen adaptation The Brady Bunch Movie, alongside Shelley Long and Gary Cole. The film was an enormous success, inspiring a sequel, but afterwards Taylor found herself threatened by typecasting. In 1996 she played a stuck-up cheerleader in The Craft, which also starred Neve Campbell. She starred in the unsuccessful FOX series Party Girl with Swoosie Kurtz, the movie based on the Parker Posey film. She then went on to play supporting roles in The Wedding Singer, with Adam Sandler and Drew Barrymore, and Kiss Toledo Goodbye, with Michael Rapaport and Christopher Walken.
Acting alongside Jack Black and Owen Wilson in Heat Vision and Jack, a FOX pilot that never aired, led to her meeting and falling in love with director Ben Stiller, who went on to give her a leading role in the comedy Zoolander. Taylor and Stiller subsequently married and had two children, Ella Olivia Stiller and Quinlin Dempsey Stiller. She had previously been romantically linked to Jason Bloom, who directed her in Overnight Delivery, Matthew Lillard, who played Shaggy in the big screen version of Scooby Doo, and Duke University basketball player Bill McCaffrey.
Taylor took time out from her film acting career to raise her children, though she continued to appear in TV shows such as Spin City and Arrested Development. Taylor appeared alongside her husband in Dodgeball: A True Underdog story and in The Mirror, which also stars her in-laws Jerry Stiller and Anne Meara.
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