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Vanessa Lachey
Filipino-born American actress, model, and host (born 1980) From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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Vanessa Joy Lachey (née Minnillo; born November 9, 1980)[1] is an American television host, model and actress. She was named Miss Teen USA in 1998. She has been a New York–based correspondent for Entertainment Tonight and hosted Total Request Live on MTV. She has starred in two network sitcoms and hosted various competition and reality shows. Lachey portrayed the lead role in the CBS crime drama television series NCIS: Hawaiʻi (2021–2024) for three seasons.[2][3]
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Early life
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Vanessa Joy Minnillo was born at the 13th Air Force Regional Medical Center at Clark Air Base in Angeles City, Philippines.[4] Her father, Vincent Charles Minnillo, is an American citizen who was born in Cleveland, Ohio, while her mother, Helen Ramos Bercero, was born in Manila, Philippines.[5][6][7][8] Minnillo has an adopted brother who is two years older.[9] Her family moved frequently because of her father's service in the Air Force. She lived in Washington, California, Nevada, Florida, Germany, and Japan and attended eleven schools in nine years. Minnillo's parents separated in 1983 and divorced in 1986.[10] Her mother left the family when Vanessa was 9 years old.[11]
Minnillo's parents both remarried. She and her brother Vincent Jr. relocated to Turkey with their mother and stepfather. By 1991, in the wake of Operation Desert Shield, they returned to their father's home, eventually settling in Charleston, South Carolina, where Minnillo attended the Roman Catholic Bishop England High School and was a junior varsity cheerleader.[citation needed] From then on, she lived with her father and stepmother, Donna. She has said she had "a very rocky, challenging and tumultuous childhood."[11] She also attended Our Lady of the Assumption Catholic School in San Bernardino, California, for one year.[citation needed]
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Career
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1998–2020: Beauty pageants and television hosting
Lachey was crowned Miss South Carolina Teen USA and won the title Miss Teen USA in 1998. She was the first Miss Teen USA from South Carolina and also the first from South Carolina to be named the pageant's Miss Congeniality.[citation needed] She was a host on MTV's The Morning After (2003) and Total Request Live (2003–2007)[12] and became a New York City correspondent for Entertainment Tonight in 2005. She hosted Miss Teen USA 2004 and Miss Universe 2007 beauty pageants.
After leaving MTV and Entertainment Tonight, Lachey was featured in print and web-based advertising for Bongo Jeans' Spring/Summer 2007 collection.[13] She launched a makeup line with Flirt! Cosmetics, which debuted in August 2007 at Kohl's department stores.[14] In May 2006, Maxim magazine ranked Lachey #15 in its annual Hot 100 issue.[15] She has been featured on the covers of numerous magazines such as Maxim, Vegas, Shape, Parents, People,[16] and Lucky.[citation needed]
Lachey was a finalist in E!'s competition to replace Brooke Burke as host of Wild On!.[10] From 2009 to 2011, she hosted ABC's TV series True Beauty. The series followed 10 contestants who competed for $100,000 and to be featured in People magazine's 100 most beautiful people issue. The series was produced by Tyra Banks and Ashton Kutcher.[17] Lachey became a co-host of ABC's game show Wipeout in December 2011.[18]
Early in her career, Lachey had small roles in numerous television shows, including That's Life, City Girls, 30 Rock, The Bold and the Beautiful, Psych, Hawaii Five-O and Maybe It's Me. In 2008, she portrayed Ashlee in the CBS sitcom How I Met Your Mother, in the episode "No Tomorrow". She portrayed Amy in the parody film Disaster Movie (2008) alongside Matt Lanter, Kim Kardashian, and Carmen Electra. The film was panned by critics, but was a moderate box-office success, grossing nearly $35 million against a $20 million budget.[19] In 2009, Lachey and Kardashian acted together again, on CBS's police procedural television series CSI: NY.[20]
In 2011, Lachey had a guest role as Carmen Chao in NBC's sitcom 30 Rock. She played Tracy in NBC's sitcom Truth Be Told (2015), about two diverse multiracial couples who are best friends, lovers and neighbors. The series ended after one season on December 25, 2015.[21] On September 6, 2017, Lachey was announced as one of the celebrities who would take part in the 25th season of Dancing with the Stars, competing against her husband, Nick. She was paired with professional dancer Maksim Chmerkovskiy,[22] and Chmerkovskiy's wife, Peta Murgatroyd, was paired with Nick. On October 30, Lachey and Chmerkovskiy became the seventh couple eliminated from the competition, finishing in joint seventh place.[23]
In 2020, Lachey and her husband Nick were announced as the hosts of the Netflix series Love Is Blind.[24] Lachey stated that the show "made literally our dreams come true in terms of being able to work together, being able to spend time together, making our marriage stronger ultimately in the end."[25] The couple has hosted every season of the show announced to date.[26]
2021–present: NCIS: Hawaiʻi and first book
On April 30, 2021, it was announced that Lachey was cast as a series regular in CBS's police procedural TV series NCIS: Hawaiʻi.[27][28] Lachey joined the cast in her first leading series role as Jane Tennant,[29] the first female Special Agent in charge of the NCIS: Pearl.[30] Her role also marked the NCIS franchise's first female lead.[3][31] It is a spin-off of the long-running series NCIS, and the fourth series in the NCIS franchise. Filming for the series began on the North Shore of Oahu on June 16, 2021.[32][33] The series debuted on September 20, 2021,[29][34] and was canceled in April 2024. The final episode aired on May 6, 2024.[3]
Lachey's first book, Life from Scratch: Family Traditions That Start with You, was released on November 16, 2021, by HarperCollins.[11][35] Co-written with Dina Gachman, the book includes recipes, parenting tips, birthday rituals, date night ideas, and personal stories.[36][37][11][38]
In 2023, she appeared in General Motors' and Netflix's Super Bowl commercial to promote electric vehicles.[39][40] She was included in Variety's "40 Most Powerful Women on Reality TV in 2023" list.[41]
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Personal life
In 2006, she began dating singer Nick Lachey after appearing in the video for his song "What's Left of Me".[42][43][44] The couple became engaged in November 2010,[45] and married on July 15, 2011, at Sir Richard Branson's private Necker Island in the British Virgin Islands.[46] They were both born on November 9, seven years apart. They have three children, son Camden John born in September 2012, daughter Brooklyn Elisabeth born January 2015, and son Phoenix Robert born December 2016.[47]
Filmography
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Film
Television
Music video
As a television personality or host
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Awards and nominations
Published works
- Lachey, Vanessa: Life from Scratch: Family Traditions That Start with You, HarperCollins, 2021.
See also
References
External links
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