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Biography
Alicia Silverstone was born on October 4, 1976, in San Francisco,
California as the youngest of three children to parents Monty
Silverstone, a real-estate investor, and Didi Silverstone, a former
flight attendant. Alicia's career began at the tender age of six
when her dad, Monty, took some photos of his young daughter. The
photos allowed her to get some modeling gigs which then led to
television commercials. After a guest spot on _"Wonder Years, The"
(1988)_ (qv) as a literal "dream girl" she moved on to movies. She
landed a role in _Crush, The (1993)_ (qv), a sort of Fatal
Attraction for teenagers in which she portrayed a disturbed young
lady obsessed with an older man. The nasty little role didn't
impress the critical establishment but it wowed its target audience
of teenagers. In fact, the role won her the 1994 MTV Movie Award
for "Best Villain" and "Breakthrough Performance." It is
interesting to note that during the filming of _Crush, The (1993)_
(qv), Alicia became an emancipated minor in order to get around
child labor laws which would have interfered with her working
hours. She was a dedicated actress from early on. _Crush, The
(1993)_ (qv) also caught the attention of Aerosmith, who hired her
to appear in a string of their music videos. The first of them,
"Cryin'" was voted the number one video of all time on MTV.
Silverstone was definitely a hit with the MTV crowd, but larger
commercial success had still eluded her. That all changed when she
landed the role of Cher in 'Amy Heckerling' (qv)'s _Clueless
(1995)_ (qv). The Cher character was the antithesis of her role in
_Crush, The (1993)_ (qv). This time around Silverstone was a naive
yet endearing girl from Beverly Hills in search of love in the
nineties. The film was a huge sleeper hit at the box office and
wowed both audiences and critics alike. It also demonstrated
Alicia's strength and bankability. She was hailed as the woman of
the hour, and branded the spokeswoman for an emerging young
generation. She signed a deal with Columbia Tristar worth $10
million and got the coveted role of Batgirl in the Batman
franchise. Also, as part of the package, she got a three-year
first-look deal for her own production company, First Kiss
Productions. The first film released by First Kiss was _Excess
Baggage (1997)_ (qv).
Biography courtesy of the Internet Movie Database (www.imdb.com).
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Alicia Silverstone
