Early life
Alba was born in Pomona, California to Catherine Alba (née Jensen) and Mark Alba. Her mother is of Danish and French Canadian descent and her father is of Mexican American descent (both his parents were born in California). She has a younger brother, Joshua. Her father's Air Force career took the family to Biloxi, Mississippi, and Del Rio, Texas before settling back in California when she was nine years old.
Alba's early life was marked by a multitude of physical maladies; she suffered collapsed lungs twice, had pneumonia 4-5 times a year, a ruptured appendix, and a cyst on her tonsils. This isolated her from other children at school because she was in the hospital so often that no one knew her well enough to befriend her. She has also acknowledged suffering from obsessive-compulsive disorder during childhood.Her health improved, however, when her family moved to California. She graduated from high school at age 16, and subsequently attended the Atlantic Theater Company.
Career
Alba expressed interest in acting since the age of five. In 1992, the 12-year-old Alba persuaded her mother to take her to an acting competition in Beverly Hills, whose grand prize was free acting classes. Alba won the grand prize, and took her first acting lessons. An agent signed Alba nine months later.
In Edmonton during the filming of Good Luck Chuck, August 2006
Her first appearance on film was a small role in the 1994 feature Camp Nowhere as Gail. She was originally hired for two weeks but her role turned into a two-month job in a leading role when one of the prominent actresses dropped out.
Alba appeared in two national television commercials for Nintendo and J.C. Penney as a child. She was later featured in several independent films. She branched out into television in 1994 with a recurring role as the vain Jessica in three episodes of the Nickelodeon comedy series The Secret World of Alex Mack. She then performed the role of Maya in the first two seasons of the television series Flipper. Under the tutelage of her lifeguard mother, Alba learned to swim before she could walk, and she was a PADI-certified scuba diver, skills which were put to use on the show, which was filmed in Australia.
In 1998, she appeared as Melissa Hauer in a first-season episode of the Steven Bochco crime-drama Brooklyn South, as Leanne in two episodes of Beverly Hills 90210 and as Layla in an episode of The Love Boat: The Next Wave. In 1999, she appeared in the Randy Quaid comedy feature P.U.N.K.S.. After Alba graduated from high school, she studied acting with William H. Macy and his wife, Felicity Huffman, at the Atlantic Theater Company, which was developed by Macy and Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright and film director, David Mamet.
Alba rose to greater prominence in Hollywood in 1999 after appearing as a member of a snobby high school clique in the Drew Barrymore romantic comedy Never Been Kissed, and as the female lead in the 1999 comedy-horror film Idle Hands, opposite Devon Sawa.
Her big break came when writer/director James Cameron picked Alba from a pool of 1,200 candidates for the role of the genetically-engineered super-soldier, Max Guevara, on the FOX sci-fi television series Dark Angel. Co-created by Cameron, the series starred Alba, and ran for two seasons until 2002, earning her critical acclaim as well as a Golden-Globe nomination.
During preparation for Dark Angel, in which Alba trained for three hours every day, the actress began to starve herself and became obsessed with exercise, going on to say, "A lot of girls have eating disorders and I did too. I got obsessed with it." Alba recalls coming to a realization that she had a problem when she dropped to just 100 lb and cites her natural introduction to puberty and her development of womanly curves as two things that caused her "concern" regarding her aesthetics. Alba, who also suffered from obsessive compulsive disorder and panic attacks, says she has been cooking for herself since the age of twelve.
Alba's most notable film roles have included an aspiring dancer-choreographer in Honey, exotic dancer Nancy Callahan in Sin City and as the classic Marvel Comics character Sue Storm, the Invisible Woman in the Fantastic Four, of which movie critic Mick LaSalle said that her performance while talking for long periods of time was on "shaky ground". She then appeared in its sequel, in Into the Blue later that year, and Good Luck Chuck a few years later. Alba went on to host the 2006 MTV Movie Awards and performed sketches spoofing the movies King Kong, Mission Impossible 3, and The Da Vinci Code.
In 2008, Alba appeared in her first horror-film role in The Eye, a remake of the Hong Kong original. In February, she hosted the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences's Science and Technical Awards. Later in the year, she starred in The Love Guru. She has signed on to star in An Invisible Sign of My Own to be released in 2009.
Alba has been represented by talent agent
Public image
In 2006, readers of Askmen.com voted Alba No. 1 on 99 Most Desirable Women, while in 2007, Maxim Magazine placed Alba on the number 2 spot of their "Top 100", after Lindsay Lohan. Both GQ and In Style had Alba on their June covers, and in May, after eight million votes, FHM (UK and USA editions) named Alba the winner as "2007’s Sexiest Woman in the World". Alba continues to be regarded as one of the world's most attractive women, being named to Maxim's Hot 100 in 2008.
Alba has been well-received in popular culture. She received the Teen Choice Award for Choice Actress and Saturn Award for Best Actress (TV) for her role in Dark Angel. She has frequently appeared on Maxim's Hot 100 list. In 2006, Alba received an MTV Movie Award for "Sexiest Performance" for Sin City.
Her acting has also drawn criticism, however, as she was nominated for a 2007 Razzie Award for Worst Actress for her performances in Awake, Good Luck Chuck, and Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer. She was also nominated for the same award in 2005 for her performances in Fantastic Four and Into the Blue.
On the cover of the March 2006 issue, Playboy magazine named Alba among its 25 Sexiest Celebrities, and the Sex Star of the Year. Alba was involved in litigation against Playboy for its use of her image (from a promotional shot for Into the Blue) without her consent, which she contends gave the appearance that she was featured in the issue in a "nude pictorial". However, she later dropped the lawsuit after receiving a personal apology from Playboy owner Hugh Hefner, who agreed to make donations to two charities that Alba has supported.
Alba fears being typecast as a sex kitten based on the bulk of parts offered to her, commenting, "Somehow, I don't think this is happening to Natalie Portman". In the interview, Alba said she wants to be taken seriously as an actress but believes she needs to do movies that she would otherwise not be interested in to build her career, stating that eventually she hopes to be more selective in her film projects.
