Rebecca Gayheart

REBECCA GAYHEART

Date of Birth: August 12, 1972

And to think, it all started at a local mall in Pinetop, Kentucky. At 14, Rebecca Gayheart, a coal miner's daughter, was approached by an employee of Elite Modeling and told she should be a model. A year later Gayheart called and asked if she could come up for the summer and try to find work. While her parents were nervous, they let her go.

At the end of the summer, when it was time to return to Pinetop, Gayheart, who had just turned 16, had other ideas. "There was no way I was going home. I got a taste of all the opportunities there were in New York, none of which I could have if I went home to Pinetop." But try telling this to your parents when you're 16. She did. And they did what any parents would do: flew to New York to bring her back. Fat chance. First, Gayheart used reason--she lined up a restaurant job and arranged to enroll in high school. When they didn't go for that, she pulled out her ace-in-the-hole. "I threatened them," she said. If they didn't let her stay in New York, she'd join the rolls of the world's oldest profession and bring shame to the family name. Needless to say, that did the trick--so to speak.

Gayheart enrolled in Professional Children's School, where her classmates included Uma Thurman, Jerry O' Connell and Sarah Michelle Gellar; got a job in a trendy Manhattan restaurant; and moved into a "model's" apartment provided by Elite, which she shared with several other aspiring Cindy Crawfords.

Gayheart's big break came at 17 when was chosen to be the Noxzema Girl. Not only did it give her finanical independence, it got her into auditions.

The following year, she was cast as the bad girl Hanna Mayberry on the (now defunct) soap opera Loving. After 18 months on Loving, Gayheart relocated to L.A. It was a big move that paid off big time. In a few months, she was starring in the NBC miniseries Invasion which led to a recurring role on the short-lived Earth 2 and a 10-episode stint on Beverly Hills 90210 playing Luke Perry's ill-fated wife.

The Aaron Spelling show opened the doors to feature films. She got to play the girl who tries to seduce Tim Robbins in a hotel elevator in Nothing To Lose. Then her career took a turn and she became the next sci-fi scream queen. There was Scream 2 followed by Urban Legend and an appearance on the TV show Sliders.

Then came roles in the independent films: Somebody is Waiting with Natassja Kinski, Hairshirt with Neve Campbell and Jawbreaker with Rose McGowan, a scathing look at high school hierarchies, not unlike the 80's classic, Heathers. She continued with horrors in From Dusk Till Dawn 3: The Hangman's Daughter (2000) and a drama, Shadow Hours starring Balthazar Getty.

She and her fiancee, Brett Ratner (he directed Jackie Chan's action-comedy, Rush Hour) have been together for more than 10 years.

Filmography:

Shadow Hours (2000)
From Dusk Till Dawn 3: The Hangman's Daughter (2000)(V)
Jawbreaker (1999)
Life After Donna Dell (1999)
Urban Legend (1998)
Hairshirt (1998)
Scream 2 (1997)
Nothing to Lose (1997)
Somebody Is Waiting (1996)
Whatever Happened to Mason Reese (1990)