Ashley Judd Biography

Ashley Judd spent most of her early years on the move, attending 12 schools in 13 years. Thanks to the success of her mother and sisters music career, as ‘The Judds’, she was able to study at the University of Kentucky.

Immediately after graduating she moved to Los Angeles in search of a career as an actress. Her first audition led to a role in ‘Kuffs’, which was closely followed by a part ‘Ruby in Paradise’ for which she received a New York Film Critics Circle award for Best Actress.

Television work in ‘Star Trek: The Next Generation’ and ‘Til Death Do Us Part’ helped increase her profile and she started to become cast as the ‘intellectual pin-up’. An Emmy and Golden Globe nomination for her portrayal of Marilyn Monroe in ‘Norma Jean and Marilyn’ also helped boost her career.

Following ‘A Time to Kill’ and ‘A Normal Life’, Judd starred in the tense thriller ‘Kiss the Girls’ alongside Morgan Freeman. The film did well at the box office and led to a part in the drama ‘Simon Birch’. The ‘thriller’ genre has proved most successful for the young actress, with ‘Double Jeopardy’ and ‘High Crimes’ also doing good business.

However, roles in ‘Where the Heart Is’, ‘The Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood’ and the musical biography of Cole Porter ‘De-Lovely’, have all helped her to avoid the shackles of Hollywood typecasting.

Following an incident where a stalker posed as a police officer to get into her home, Judd tends to shy away from the celebrity limelight.