Jennifer Ann "Jenny"1 McCarthy (born November 1, 1972)2 is an American model, comedian, actress, author, and activist. She first entered the public eye by appearing in Playboy magazine in October 1993, being named Playmate of the Year in June 1994. Soon after, she would launch an acting career in both film and television. Recently, she has written books on parenting issues and has become an activist promoting the awareness of Autism.
Early life
McCarthy was born in Chicago, Illinois. Her father is of Irish descent and her mother is of German descent. McCarthy comes from a middle class Catholic family that lived in the West Elsdon neighborhood. She is the second of four daughters; her sisters are named Lynette, Joanne, and Amy. Her cousin is Melissa McCarthy of Gilmore Girls fame. McCarthy's mother, Linda, was a housewife and courtroom custodian, and her father, Dan McCarthy, was a steel mill foreman.34 She attended St. Turibius Grade School on Chicago's South Side. As a teenager, McCarthy attended Mother McAuley Liberal Arts High School (whose school sweater she donned in the pages of Playboy) and was cheerleader at both Brother Rice High School and St. Laurence High Schools,5 although she has referred to herself as an "outcast" at her school.6 After McCarthy graduated from high school, she attended Southern Illinois University Carbondale to study nursing. She needed money to pay for college, so she decided to submit her picture to Playboy magazine to make money. She was accepted and became a model.
Career
Modeling and acting career
After getting accepted by Playboy in 1993, the magazine wanted her to pose for the October issue. McCarthy was paid $30,000 for the photo shoot. McCarthy became the Playmate of the Month and later the Playmate of the Year. In 1994, thanks to this newfound attention and popularity, McCarthy moved to Los Angeles and, for a time, hosted Hot Rocks, a Playboy TV show featuring uncensored music videos.
In 1995, MTV chose McCarthy to be the host of a new dating show called Singled Out, for which she left Hot Rocks. Her job as a host was a success, and Playboy wanted her to do more modeling. That same year, she also appeared at WrestleMania XI as a guest valet for Shawn Michaels. She left after the match with the victor, WWF Heavyweight Champion Diesel. She returned to the WWE on the August 2, 2008 edition of Saturday Night's Main Event to thank the fans for supporting Generation Rescue. In 1996, McCarthy landed a small part in the comedy The Stupids. In 1997, McCarthy launched two shows. The first one was an MTV sketch comedy show called The Jenny McCarthy Show, which was popular enough that NBC signed her to do a sitcom later that year called Jenny. The latter show is generally considered a disappointment and was quickly canceled. Also in 1997, she appeared on one of two covers for the September issue of Playboy (the other cover featured Pamela Anderson). McCarthy also released an autobiography: Jen-X.
In 1998, McCarthy starred in BASEketball. In 1999, she starred in Diamonds, a movie which was directed by her husband John Mallory Asher. The next year, she appeared in the horror movie Scream 3. Since 2001, McCarthy has guest starred in such shows as Stacked, Charmed, The Drew Carey Show, Wings, Fastlane, and Just Shoot Me!.
In 2003, McCarthy appeared in Scary Movie 3 along with model and actress Pamela Anderson. In 2005, McCarthy produced, wrote, and starred in Dirty Love along with Carmen Electra. The same year, McCarthy hosted a new show on E! called Party at the Palms. The reality show, which is filmed at The Palms Hotel in Las Vegas, features hotel guests, party goers, and celebrities. In March 2006, she was given Razzie Awards for "Worst Actress", "Worst Screenplay", and "Worst Picture" for her work on Dirty Love, which also netted her then-husband, John Asher, a Razzie for "Worst Director."
McCarthy has continued her work with Playboy over the years, both as a model and in other capacities. She appeared on the cover of the magazine's January 2005 issue wearing a leopard skin bunny suit and was featured in a pictorial shot at Elvis Presley's Graceland mansion in the same issue. She was the second woman (Carmen Electra was the first) and first Playmate to become a celebrity photographer for the Playboy Cyber Club, getting behind the camera to photograph model Jennifer Madden, who is not a Playmate.
Jenny's younger sister, Amy, has also posed for Playboy. She was a Cyber Girl of the Week and the Cyber Girl of the Month for January 2005.7
She is the current voice of Six in the third season of Canadian CGI Sci-Fi cartoon Tripping the Rift.
McCarthy currently stars in an online five episode series, called In The Motherhood, along with Chelsea Handler and Leah Remini. The show is on MSN and is based on being a mother where users could submit their stories to have it made into real webisodes.
She also plays the role of Agent Tanya in the video game Command and Conquer: Red Alert 3.
Public persona
Though McCarthy initially rose to fame because of her sexual image, a frequent source of her celebrity derives from toilet humor. McCarthy once modeled for Candie's, a shoe company. In one magazine ad, McCarthy posed on a toilet seat, with her underwear near her ankles. Cultural scholar Collin Gifford Brooke wrote that the ad's "taboo nature" brought it attention, while noting that the ad itself helped to weaken that taboo.8 Another Candie's ad depicted McCarthy passing gas in a crowded elevator.
A sketch on her MTV show centered on her character, a well-coifed business woman, answering the question of "What did you have for lunch?" by seeming to force herself to vomit all over a table which she then ate on-screen. This was faked using special effects. The direct contrast of McCarthy's reputation as a sex symbol and this often grotesque humor is closely associated with her image. This image was taken to a new extreme in her film Dirty Love, which featured McCarthy's character sitting in a massive pool of her own menstrual blood.9
Personal life
In 1993, McCarthy underwent breast augmentation to enhance her look as a model for Playboy. McCarthy had the implants downsized in 1998.
McCarthy dated her manager Ray Manzella for a short time in 1998. After breaking up with Manzella, McCarthy began dating actor/director John Mallory Asher.10 The couple became engaged in January 1999, and married on September 11 of that year. They have a son, Evan Joseph, born on May 18, 2002. Evan is autistic. In August 2005, McCarthy and Asher filed for divorce.
In a February 2006 interview with Howard Stern, adult actress Jenna Jameson said she had two sexual encounters with McCarthy.11 When McCarthy visited Stern's show in April 2006, she denied having sex with Jameson, but said she "made out" with her during the two encounters. McCarthy also took a lie detector test and passed the questions regarding Jameson. During the appearance, McCarthy also admitted to having performed oral sex on women and that she cheated on her ex-husband with both men and women.12 However, in a later appearance on Jimmy Kimmel Live!, she claimed they didn't cheat on each other because it was agreed upon.
In December 2005, McCarthy began dating Jim Carrey. They did not make their relationship public until June 2006. She announced on The Ellen DeGeneres Show on April 2, 2008 that she and Carrey are now living together, but have no plans to marry, as they do not need a "piece of paper".
Her brother-in-law is NHL hockey player Dan Hinote of the St. Louis Blues. Dan is married to her younger sister Amy.13
She is also an avid Chicago White Sox fan.14
Activism and autism controversy
In May 2007, McCarthy announced that her son was diagnosed with autism in 2005. The disorder of McCarthy's son began with seizures and his improvement occurred after the seizures were treated; these symptoms are more consistent with Landau-Kleffner syndrome, which often is misdiagnosed as autism.15 McCarthy served as a spokesperson for Talk About Curing Autism (TACA) from June 2007 until October 2008.16 She participated in fundraisers, online chats, and other activities for the non-profit organization to help families affected by autism spectrum disorders. Her first fundraiser for TACA, Ante Up for Autism,17 was held on October 20, 2007, in Irvine, California. Louder than Words: A Mother's Journey in Healing Autism was published September 17, 2007. She has stated both in her book and during her appearance on The Oprah Winfrey Show that her husband was unable to deal with their son's autism, which led to their divorce. She added that her relationship with Jim Carrey has made it easier on her and that finding someone who loves her and her son is great. McCarthy also told Oprah Winfrey that her son was developing normally until he received his measles, mumps, and rubella vaccine (at 15 months of age) and claimed that they were the cause.18 McCarthy's claims on television that vaccines cause autism have contributed to parental concerns about a possible link;19 parental concerns have led to decreased immunization rates and increased incidence of measles, a highly contagious and sometimes deadly disease.20 McCarthy has stated at many talk shows and rallies that chelation therapy helped her son recover from autism; the underlying rationale for chelation, which is that mercury in vaccines causes autism, has been roundly rejected by scientific studies, with the National Institute of Mental Health concluding that autistic children are unlikely to receive any benefit in return for the risk of cognitive and emotional problems due to the chelating agent itself.21
On April 2, 2008, she appeared on a Larry King Live special dedicated to autism.22
Publications
McCarthy began her writing career in 1997 with her first book, Jen-X: Jenny McCarthy's Open Book, an autobiography.
In recent years, McCarthy has written a successful series of books about her experiences with pregnancy and raising her son, Evan:
McCarthy is also an occasional columnist for FHM magazine and has also recently appeared in a commercial for Weight Watchers after successfully losing and maintaining her post-pregnancy weight by following the program. She is also the spokesperson for Talk About Curing Autism (TACA), and is a member of the board of Generation Rescue.
Appearances in Playboy special editions
- Playboy's Playmate Review Vol. May 10, 1994 - front & back covers, pages 82-91.
- Playboy's Girls of Summer '94 June 1994.
- Playboy's Book of Lingerie Vol. July 38, 1994.
- Playboy's Playmates at Play July 1994 - pages 6-7.
- Playboy's Book of Lingerie Vol. September 39, 1994 - page 25.
- Playboy's Wet & Wild Playmates September 1994 - page 73.
- Playboy's Book of Lingerie Vol. 4November 0, 1994.
- Playboy's Nudes November 1994 - cover.
- Playboy's Playmates in Bed Vol. January 1, 1995.
- Playboy's Supermodels February 1995.
- Playboy's Book of Lingerie Vol. 4July 4, 1995 - cover.
- Playboy's Nudes October 1995.
- Playboy's Winter Girls February 1996.
- Playboy's Celebrating Centerfolds Vol. December 1, 1998 - pages 6-7.
Filmography
Television work
See also
References
- ^ "Biography for Jenny McCarthy". IMDb.com, Inc.. Retrieved on 2008-05-09.
- ^ "Jenny McCarthy Profile" E! Online. Retrieved 2007-09-19.
- ^ Heroine Worship: Jenny McCarthy, The McCarthy Era
- ^ Jenny McCarthy Biography (1972-)
- ^ Austin, Michael and Jennifer Wehunt, "Before They Were Famous," Chicago, pg. 76, February 2007, Volume 56, number 2.
- ^ USA WEEKEND Magazine
- ^ "Amy McCarthy". Playboy.com (January 2005). Retrieved on 2007-09-18.
- ^ Collin Gifford Brooke (2003). "Sex(haustion) Sells: Marketing in a Saturated Mediascape". in Tom Reichert and Jacqueline Lambiase. Sex in Advertising: Perspectives on the Erotic Appeal, Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. ISBN 0805841180, http://books.google.com/books?id=ZivAGEvtpDcC&pg=PA136&dq=jenny+mccarthy+candies+toilet&ie=ISO-8859-1&sig=B_5OJwt2AQtChGbXBiJ7c8InxB4.
- ^ Glory At The Razzies For Tom Cruise & Nicole Kidman - Hecklerspray: Music, Movies, TV, Celebs, Games and Gossip
- ^ Orecklin, Michele (1999-02-01). "JENNY COME BACK". Time. Time Inc.. Retrieved on 2008-10-05.
- ^ MarksFriggin.com - Stern Show News - Archive
- ^ MarksFriggin.com - Stern Show News - Archive
- ^ [1]
- ^ "Famous faces among White Sox fans". Retrieved on 2008-08-18.
- ^ Rubin DB (2008). "Fanning the vaccine-autism link". Neurol Today 8 (15): 3, http://neurotodayonline.com/pt/re/neurotoday/fulltext.00132985-200808070-00005.htm.
- ^ Ackerman L (2008-10-05). "TACA & Jenny McCarthy". Retrieved on 2008-11-04.
- ^ Ante Up For Autism : : Taca
- ^ "Jenny McCarthy and Holly Robinson Peete—Their Fight to Save Their Autistic Sons", Jenny McCarthy on The Oprah Winfrey Show, 2007-09-18. Retrieved 2007-09-24.
- ^ Fallik D (2008). "After vaccine-autism case settlement, MDs urged to continue recommending vaccines". Neurol Today 8 (11): 1, 8, http://www.neurotodayonline.com/pt/re/neurotoday/fulltext.00132985-200806050-00001.htm;jsessionid=JS1bWl7x5t4BBymhWyFMGDLfLvKJsKTn7pw3s2Zqfvcl3gndQLwL!-749683226!181195629!8091!-1.
- ^ Lin RG II (2008-05-02). "Rise in measles prompts concern", Los Angeles Times. Retrieved on 4 November 2008.
- ^ Stokstad E (2008). "Stalled trial for autism highlights dilemma of alternative treatments". Science 321 (5887): 326. doi:10.1126/science.321.5887.326. PMID 18635766.
- ^ [2]
- ^ Amazon.com: Louder Than Words: A Mother's Journey in Healing Autism: Books: Jenny McCarthy
- ^ Amazon.com: Mother Warriors: A Nation of Parents Healing Autism Against All Odds: Books: Jenny McCarthy
External links
