Actress Kristen Anne Bell was born on July 18, 1980, and is without a doubt most known for her role as Veronica Mars, the leading lady, protagonist, and young aspiring detective on the television series of the same name.
She was born into a Polish American family in Michigan and broke into the big and competitive world of show business as a tree and a banana in a Detroit theater production of Raggedy Ann and Andy when she was just eleven years old, and several years later she took the lead as Dorothy in her high school’s production The Wizard of Oz.
In 1998 Bell graduated high school and landed a minor role in the locally filmed Polish Wedding, which starred Claire Danes in the main role, as well as Jon Bradford, Lena Olin, Ramsey Krull, Gabriel Byrne, Daniel Lapaine, and Mili Avital.
After graduation Bell attended New York University, and left in 2001 to portray Becky Thatcher in the Broadway rendition of The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and then appeared in her first official film credit, Pootie Tang, starring Lance Crouther, JB Smoove, and Jennifer Coolidge.
Around this time, Bell also auditioned for the part of Chloe Sullivan on the hit TV drama Smallville—a series based on Clark ’s (played by Tom Welling) teenage years, which airs on the CW Network—but lost to Allison Mack.
Bell went on to appear in Broadway musicals, guest star in various TV shows, and appear in small films until what most consider her breakthrough role in 2004 as the president of the United States’ kidnapped daughter in Spartan, acting with Val Kilmer.
Later that same year, Bell snagged the lead role on Veronica Mars, then on the UPN, which premiered on September 22, 2004. It is now in its third season, having moved onto the new CW network, immediately following Gilmore Girls, which stars super mother-daughter tag team Lauren Graham and Alexis Bledel.
Bell plays a student (first high school, later college) who moonlights as a detective, following in the footsteps of private investigator father Keith Mars, played by Enrico Colantoni. The show quickly gained a loyal fan following and earned positive reviews and critical acclaim, which has only increased since its move to the CW as a follow-up to Gilmore Girls.
Bell’s individual fame also increased when she performed the Fame theme for the 57th Annual Primetime Emmy Awards’ Emmy Idol in 2005. She also received the Saturn Award for Best Actress on Television a year later. The magazines liked her, too and in the summer of 2005, Bell posed for Jane magazine and was named in their Eleven People You’d most Like to See Naked list. She also was the cover feature for Maxim in March 2006, having moved from #68 in 2005 to #11 in the magazine’s Hot 100 of 2005.
Bell has also recently kept herself occupied with roles in films (Fifty Pills, a Tribeca Film Festival entry; the independent The Receipt; Roman; and the 2006 horror remake Pulse, co-starring Ian Somerhalder and Christina Milian), and, according to Ashton Kutcher, Bell, who appeared on Kutcher’s Punk’d, regularly saves lost dogs in her spare time.
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