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Biography - Born 11/29/1976
When Anna Faris' college roommate first saw Faris in her breakthrough role in "Scary Movie," the ex-roomie called the actress in surprise and told her "That's so weird that you were cast, because you are not funny." Hollywood has continually disagreed with that assessment, casting Faris in several projects where her comedic skills--subtle or, if Faris is to be believed, even unintentional--were allowed to shine.
An actress and performer since age six, the naturally blond, Seattle-bred beauty began her acting career in the independent horror feature, "Lover's Lane." In 2000, she received her breakout role as the hapless Cindy Campbell in the Wayans Brothers' horror spoof feature "Scary Movie". It was during the filming of "Scary Movie" that Faris decided to dye her blond tresses to black in an attempt to to make her character look more like Neve Campbell and Jennifer Love Hewitt in the "Scream" and "I Know What You Did Last Summer" features, the already-self-aware slasher hits "Scary Movie" was primarily parodying. The consistently amusing, often crude but good-natured spoof was a surprise hit--with much deserved credit going to Faris for her vanity-less performance (an admiring Hewitt sent her a bouquet of roses after seeing the film)--and the actress returned again under director Keenan Ivory Wayans' guidance for the lesser 2001 sequel "Scary Movie 2" and its 2003 non-Wayans follow-up, "Scary Movie 3" (with her clueless character promoted to the full lead and parodyed Courteney Cox rather than Campbell).
Faris' performance in the low-brow Rob Schneider comedy "The Hot Chick" (2002) was also singled out as one of the film's few redeeming features, and she bowled critics and audiences over with her brief but potently hilarious supporting turn as the vacuous actress Kelly, who visits Japan in director Sophia Coppola's "Lost In Translation" (2003). Faris admited to basing her improved, empty-headed performance on a real-life Hollywood actress, but emphatically denied much-circulated Internet rumors that Cameron Diaz was her inspiration. While hoping to avoid Hollywood flavor of the month labels and explore more challenging and dramatic indie fare, the actress also shrewdly took on another major comedic role with much mainstream exposure when she was cast in a three-epsiode stint during the final season of "Friends" in 2003-2004, playing the birth mother of the baby Monica and Chandler plan to adopt.
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