October 4: "The Aerosmith Chick" - Alicia Silverstone is 37-years-old today.

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Did you know?

During her career, she turned down several key roles in films, including Dede Truitt in The Opposite of Sex and a role in Scream 3. She was also considered for roles in Scream 2, Bewitched, Little Women and Heartbreakers. She turned down the role of Valerie Malone on Beverly Hills, 90210 in 1994; Tiffani Thiessen was cast instead.

Silverstone won several awards for her film performances, including MTV Movie Awards, National Board of Review, Young Artist Awards, and an American Comedy Award. She has been nominated for an Emmy award and a Golden Globe Award.

Silverstone's half-sister is London-based rock singer Kezi Silverstone.

She once said she hates the trappings of fame, saying, "Fame is not anything I wish on anyone. You start acting because you love it. Then success arrives, and suddenly you're on show."

 

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Silverstone was born in San Francisco, California.  When she was six years old, she began modeling and was subsequently cast in television commercials, the first being for Domino's Pizza. She acquired some early modeling and advertising work and was eventually cast as "dream girl" Jessica on the episode "Road Test" on The Wonder Years.

Silverstone won a leading part in the 1993 film The Crush, playing a teenaged girl who sets out to ruin an older man after he spurns her affections; she won two awards at the 1994 MTV Movie Awards for the role—Best Breakthrough Performance and Best Villain. 

Also in 1993, Silverstone auditioned for the lead role of Angela Chase in the ABC TV series My So-Called Life, but Claire Danes was chosen for the role instead. Alicia made some television movies in her early career including Torch Song, Cool and the Crazy and Scattered Dreams.

After seeing her in The Crush, music video director Marty Callner decided Silverstone would be perfect for a role in a music video he was directing for the band Aerosmith, called "Cryin'. She was subsequently cast in two more videos, "Amazing" and "Crazy." These were hugely successful for both the band and Silverstone, giving her the nickname, "the Aerosmith chick.") They also got her noticed by filmmaker Amy Heckerling, who, after seeing them, decided to cast her in Clueless.

Clueless became a sleeper hit during the summer of 1995. Silverstone's performance was well received, and she signed a deal with Columbia-TriStar worth $10 million. As part of the package, she got a three-year first-look deal for her own production company, First Kiss Productions.

Silverstone also won "Best Female Performance" and "Most Desirable Female" at the 1996 MTV Movie Awards for her performance in the film. In the same year, Silverstone starred in the erotic thriller The Babysitter, film adaptation of the novel by Dean Koontz, Hideaway.

Silverstone's next role was as Batgirl in Batman & Robin, which was not a critical success. Silverstone's turn as Batgirl was not well received, and won her a Razzie Award for Worst Supporting Actress. However she also won a Blimp Award at the Kid's Choice Awards for the role.

In addition to Batman & Robin, Silverstone also starred in 1997's dark comedy Excess Baggage, which was the first movie to be released by her production company, First Kiss Productions.

Silverstone ended the 1990s with the Saturn Award-nominated romance/comedy film Blast from the Past.  In 40 Hottest Hotties of the '90s she was ranked #5. Topsocialite.com listed her as the 3rd Sexiest woman of the '90s.

In 2000, Silverstone appeared in Kenneth Branagh's film adaptation of the Shakespeare play Love's Labour's Lost, in which she was required to sing and dance.

In 2002, she made her Broadway debut in The Graduate. After removing herself from the public eye for a few years, she resurfaced in the short-lived 2003 NBC television show Miss Match, which was canceled after 11 episodes.

In 2005, she co-starred with Queen Latifah in Beauty Shop, a spinoff of the BarberShop films, as one of the stylists in the beauty shop. In the same year, she played a reporter in Scooby Doo 2: Monsters Unleashed.

In 2006, she starred in the film Stormbreaker, and appeared in the Hallmark Hall of Fame made-for-TV movie Candles on Bay Street, based on the book by Cathie Pelletier. Silverstone continued her theatre work, next appearing in David Mamet's Boston Marriage and Speed-the-Plow.

She reprised her role in Time Stands Still alongside Laura Linney in the New York production of the play on Broadway, which premiered on January 28, 2010. The play received good reviews with the New York Times praising Silverstone, saying she "brings warmth, actorly intelligence and delicate humour."

Silverstone next appeared in the teen romance The Art of Getting By, which premiered at the 2011 Sundance Film Festival.

She will appear in Butter as the adoptive mother of a 12-year old African American girl who enters a local butter sculpture competition in a small Iowa town. She is also to appear alongside Sigourney Weaver and Krysten Ritter in Vamps, playing a vampire.  


Silverstone married her longtime boyfriend, rock musician (for the band S.T.U.N.) and basketball coach Christopher Jarecki. They live in an eco-friendly Los Angeles house complete with solar panels and an organic vegetable garden. She bought the house, shared with a "menagerie of rescued dogs," in 1996.

From PETA Advertisement.

In 2009, Silverstone released The Kind Diet, a guide to vegan nutrition, and launched its associated website The Kind Life. The Kind Diet has topped the New York Times best sellers list. The book was mostly ghostwritten by nutritionist Jessica Porter. 


On May 5, 2011, Alicia gave birth to a baby boy named Bear Blu Jarecki.

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For more about Alicia, visit her personal Website:

http://www.thekindlife.com/

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