Jaime Pressly in Cruel World
An actress who used her blonde girl-next-door looks to good effect with a number of decidedly sinister roles, Jaime Pressly moved from exploitative late 1990s direct-to-video fare to a more legitimate acting career, showing potential and skill with both comedy and drama in the unlikely vehicle “Ringmaster” (1998) as well as her featured regular role on The WB’s twenty-something romantic comedy series “Jack & Jill” (1999-2001). Her film debut was in 1997’s cable-friendly erotic thriller “Poison Ivy: The New Seduction” and posing for Playboy that same year made Pressly’s body far more famous than her body of work. Still, those who looked past the film’s disproportionate amount of nudity would find that Pressly made the most of her role and brought an eerie coolness to the part of Violet that proved she had more to offer.
A trained dancer and gymnast with years of experience to her credit, the self-described tomboy showcased her athleticism with a role as assistant gymnastics coach Nikki Lang on the short-lived ABC drama “Push” (1998). Moviegoers could also catch her on the big screen that year in the high school graduation party comedy “Can’t Hardly Wait.” Despite being credited simply as Girlfriend No. 1, Pressly was featured prominently as a popular cheerleader dating a popular athlete. Her portrayal perfectly captured all of the condescending cattiness moviegoers expect from a high school golden girl without veering completely into camp. Just as she showed hints of undisclosed talent in “Poison Ivy: The New Seduction,” Pressly was beginning to make the most of her angel-faced bad girl onscreen persona with performances that showed unexpected depth and range. The Jerry Springer feature vehicle “Ringmaster” was an unlikely stage for the actress’s increasing skill, but even here, she brought scope to her character, a sex-crazed talk show guest carrying her stepfather’s child.
Regular series work on “Jack & Jill” offered Pressly the opportunity to develop her character and find an audience. Here she played Audrey, the roommate and friend since high school of Amanda Peet’s Jack. The show not only gave Pressly a chance to essay a fully realized character, but as Audrey, she was portraying a far more relatable character than she had before, one with a passion for dance and a healthy romantic relationship. Despite rocky ratings, “Jack & Jill” was picked up by The WB for a second season but during the series’ hiatus, Pressly kept busy with a spate of film roles. After a turn as a thoughtful rich girl who runs with an exciting guy from the wrong side of the tracks in the independent drama “Trash” (1999), she was featured in an over the top comedic role as a woman who loves money and tacky clothing in the independent comedy “Poor White Trash” (shot in 1999).
In 2000, Pressly filmed the police thriller “Ticker,” cast alongside Dennis Hopper and Tom Sizemore and was featured in the road movie comedy “Joe Dirt.” A role in the ensemble comedy “Tomcats” followed in 2001. Showing a talent for comedy as well as a good sense of humor about herself, Pressly starred in the E! Entertainment Network’s original movie “Best Actress” (2000), playing a soft-core porn actress whose major career change lands her in the running for the titular Academy Award. While her own real life career arc didn’t quite hit either extreme, Pressly’s move into more established projects and her promise as a performer would help the actress trade in her vampy teen seductress past for a more stable and varied acting future – though she would take on one last teen vamp role as Priscilla the Bitchy Cheerleader in the spoof “Not Another Teen Movie” (2001).
Pressly next detoured into several TV guest appearances on series such as “Charmed” (WB, 1998-2006) “The Twilight Zone” (UPN, 2002-03), “Fastlane” (Fox, 2002-03) and “Becker” (CBS, 1998-2004), as well as the covers of various “laddie” magazines such as Maxim and a series of odd telephone service commercials. After launching her own lingerie line called J’Aime in 2003, the actress returned to the big screen as a badass biker babe with a penchant for tonguing her lip ring in the videogame-like motorcycle action thriller, “Torque” (2004), and landed a recurring role on the modest NBC sitcom “Happy Family” (2003-04). She capped off a high profile 2004 with her second Playboy spread, a more artsy endeavor that put her on the cover and, she noted, did not involve complete full-frontal nudity.
After appearing as herself on episodes of “Entourage” (HBO, 2004- ) and “The Starlet” (WB, 2005), Pressly landed a regular role as Joy Turner on “My Name is Earl” (NBC, 2005- ), a comedy starring Jason Lee as a dimwitted crook who has an epiphany after winning the lottery to rectify all the mistakes he’s made throughout his life. Cast as the crude, rude, trailer park dwelling ex-wife of Lee’s title character, Pressly displayed an unexpected natural flair for comedy. Thanks to “My Name is Earl,” Pressly quickly made a name for herself and on Sept. 16, 2007, the sexy blond actress received her first-ever Emmy award for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series.
Born: on 07/30/1977 in Kinston, North CarolinaJob Titles: Actor, Dancer, ModelFamily
Brother: Jim Pressly.
Father: James Liston Pressly. Jaime legally emancipated from her parents at age 15
Mother: Brenda Sue Smith. Jaime legally emancipated from her parents at age 15
Sister: Jessie Pressly.
Son: Dezi James Cubiche. born May 11, 2007; father, Eric Cubiche
Significant Others
Companion: Eric Cubiche. deejay on LA’s The Beat 100.3; engaged as of September 2006
Companion: Robert Ritchie. dating briefly in 2004; no longer together
Companion: Carson Daly. met on New Year’s Eve 2001
Companion: Simon Rex. dated until July 2001
Milestones
1991 Began modeling at age 14 (date approximate)
1997 Starred as bad girl Violet in the uninspired sequel “Poison Ivy: The New Seduction”
1998 Had recurring role on the syndicated action series “Mortal Kombat: Conquest”
1998 Had featured supporting role in the high school graduation party-set comedy “Can’t Hardly Wait”
1998 Played a young woman featured on “The Jerry Springer Show” in the comedy feature “Ringmaster”
1999 Cast as Audrey, the roommate and high school friend of Jack (Amanda Peet) on the WB series “Jack & Jill”
1999 Played a rich girl happily slumming with trailer park dwellers in the teen drama “Trash”
2000 Acted in the teen comedy “100 Girls”
2000 Co-starred as a trophy wife and schemer in the independent comedy “Poor White Trash”
2000 Starred in the E! original movie “Best Actress” as a manipulating former soft-porn star
2001 Acted in the ensemble of the comedy “Tomcats”
2001 Featured in the road movie comedy “Joe Dirt”
2004 Played Alex, the sassy dental assistant on the sitcom “Happy Family”
2004 Played a crazed motorcycle-riding criminal in “Torque”
2005 Cast as Earl’s ex-wife Joy in the NBC comedy “My Name is Earl”; received Emmy (2006) and SAG (2007) nominations for Best Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series
2006 Played a kidnapped college student in the thriller, “Cruel World”
2007 Played Tina Armstrong, in the movie based on the popular video game, “DOA: Dead or Alive”
Studied dance and gymnastics beginning in her early childhood
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