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Name:
Jessica Simpson
Birth Name: Jessica Ann Simpson
Height: 5' 3"
Sex: F
Nationality: American
Birth Date: July 10, 1980
Birth Place: Dallas, Texas, USA
Profession: singer
Education: J.J. Pearce High School Richardson in Texas
(graduated in 1998)
Husband: Nick Lachey (member of 98 Degrees; born on November
9, 1973; married on October 26, 2002 in Austin, Texas;
separated on November 23, 2005)
Father: Joe Simpson
Mother: Tina Simpson
Sister: Ashlee Simpson (actress; born on October 3, 1984)
Claim to fame: Album: Sweet Kisses
Fan Mail : Jessica Simpson Fan Club
5116 North Jupiter Road
Garland, TX 75044
USA
favorite song on her album: heart of innocence & where you are
favorite food: tex-mex & chicken fried steak
favorite restaurant: chewy's [thanx lyz for clearin dis up!]
favorite color: red
favorite cd: mariah carey's christmas album
favorite movie: anything romantic or anything with julia
roberts
favorite tv show: dawson's creek
favorite singers: mariah carey, whitney houston, celine dion
high school attended: j.j. pierce [this too!]
Biography
Early life and beginning
Simpson was born in Waco, Texas and raised in Richardson, a
suburb of Dallas, Texas. She is the daughter of Joe Truett
Simpson (a former Baptist youth minister) and Tina Ann Drew (a
former Sunday School teacher). She has a younger sister,
Ashlee, who launched her own music career in mid-2004. Jessica
started singing at the age of twelve as a part of her Baptist
church choir. At the same age, she made an unsuccessful
application for The New Mickey Mouse Club, which starred
fellow pop singers Christina Aguilera, Britney Spears and
Justin Timberlake, among other future stars.
Simpson attended J.J. Pearce High School in Richardson, Texas.
She was discovered singing at a church camp by a head of a
small contemporary Christian record label and recorded an
album over the next three years; however, the label folded
before the record could be released. She dropped out in her
senior year in order to tour and promote her demo album, which
was funded by her grandmother, Joyce (thus the reason for the
name of her 2004 holiday album, ReJoyce: The Christmas Album);
she later earned her GED. During this time, she toured with
the Christian Youth Conference circuit performing with Kirk
Franklin, God's Property and CeCe Winans. She and her father
sold copies of the album after her performances.
Tommy Mottola of Columbia Records obtained a copy of the album
and, thinking she had potential as a pop singer, signed her as
such. Christian influences can still be found in much of her
music.
1999–2002: Pop music beginnings
Irresistible album coverIn late 1999, Simpson released her
debut album Sweet Kisses, which reached a peak of number
twenty-five on the U.S. Billboard 200 chart and also made the
top forty of the UK charts. The album proved to be a success,
selling two million copies in the U.S. Her first single, the
platinum-selling "I Wanna Love You Forever," reached the top
five of the U.S. Billboard Hot 100 singles chart and the top
ten in Canada and the UK. Her second single, a duet with
then-boyfriend Nick Lachey of boyband 98 Degrees, "Where You
Are", was a modest radio hit. The last single from the album,
"I Think I'm in Love with You", was a top forty hit in the
U.S. and a top twenty hit in Canada and the UK. In 2000,
Simpson won two Teen Choice Awards for Choice Breakout Artist
and Love Song of the Year ("Where You Are"). In 2000, Jessica
appeared on the 98 Degrees video My Everything.
Released during the summer of 2001, Simpson's second effort
Irresistible reached the top ten of the Billboard 200 and top
twenty of the Canadian album chart. Despite this improvement
over her debut, the album's sales were less than satisfactory;
to-date, it has only managed to be certified gold in the U.S.
for selling 500,000 copies. The title track lead single,
"Irresistible", reached the top twenty in the U.S., Canada,
and the UK, as well as the top forty in Australia. A follow-up
single entitled "A Little Bit" was also released, but failed
to achieve substantial success. In 2002, Columbia Records
released a EP remix album titled This Is the Remix containing
electro-dance remixes of Jessica's biggest hits.
2003–2005: Marriage and career development
On October 26, 2002, Simpson married Nick Lachey. She famously
announced that she remained a virgin until her wedding night,
making Lachey the only man she had been with intimately.
During the summer of 2003, Simpson and Lachey's reality show
Newlyweds began airing on MTV. Although Simpson was moderately
famous before the series began, the show is considered the
crowning glory of her career.
Throughout the run of four seasons she seemed to epitomize the
stereotypical dumb blonde, notably when she asked whether the
Chicken of the Sea tuna she was eating was chicken or fish,
and when she thought that buffalo wings were made from actual
buffalo. Her apparent stupidity helped make the show a huge
hit, making the average rating for each episode about 1.4
million viewers. (The gaffe was also a running joke in a Pizza
Hut commercial, where she was shown to be annoyed at having
her intelligence mocked again.) When introduced to Interior
Secretary Gale Norton, Simpson responded: "You've done a nice
job decorating the White House". It has been suggested that
her apparent lack of intelligence is simply an act she has
parlayed into various commercial, television and film
endorsements.
Banking on the success of her new popularity, she appeared on
a variety show with Lachey on the ABC called the Nick and
Jessica Variety Hour in 2004. A pilot for a sitcom on ABC was
also planned, but was rejected by network executives in May
2004. During that summer, Simpson won three Teen Choice Awards
for Female Fashion Icon, Hottie Female, and Female
Reality/Variety TV Star for Newlyweds. In 2005, the series won
a People's Choice Award for Favorite Reality Show and wrapped
shortly after.
In This Skin album coverSimpson's third album, In This Skin,
was released during the summer of 2003 to coincide with the
premiere of Newlyweds. Though initially the album was not a
huge success, it rebounded on the charts when a special
collector's edition was released in the spring of 2004. It
subsequently reached a peak of number two on the Billboard 200
and the top forty of the UK charts, due largely to the success
of Newlyweds. The album eventually proved to be her most
commercially successful, selling almost three million copies
in the U.S.; it also yielded arguably her most successful
single to-date, "With You".
Simpson released a holiday album in late 2004 entitled ReJoyce:
The Christmas Album, which sold moderately. During the summer
of 2005, Simpson made her first major film appearance as Daisy
Duke in The Dukes of Hazzard. The film debuted at number one
on the U.S. box-office chart, grossing more than thirty
million USD. One of the songs from the film's soundtrack,
"These Boots Are Made for Walkin'", was sung by Simpson. The
track won a People's Choice Award for Favorite Song from a
Movie in early 2006.Her performance however, was lambasted by
film critics, and she was nominated for worst supporting
actress in the Razzie Awards;Jessica's sister Ashlee was also
nominated for her role in the film Undiscovered.
In November 2005, after months of speculation, Simpson and her
husband Nick Lachey officially announced that they had split.
Simpson filed for divorce on December 16, 2005, citing
"irreconcilable differences".[1] She has asked the courts not
to grant Lachey spousal support. Since, the couples divorce
has been highly publisised worldwide. Lachey is reportedly
trying to take half of the couples joint worth. Together they
are worth $80million, but Nick has contributed a mere $6
million. At the time of their marriage, Nick was wealthier
from the Boy Band 98 degrees, since Simpson has shot to
superstardom with a net worth of more than $79 million. The
couple sold their Calabassas mansion to Malcolm in the Middle
star, Justin Berfield for an undisclosed amount.
2006: Currently
Simpson's next album, And the Band Played On, is set to be
released May 16 with Epic Records. It has been described by
Simpson as having "a little bit of everything in it", and it
will sound like "Billie Holiday, Patsy Cline, Stevie Nicks –
it's all over the place. But then there's songs for us girls
to dance to in the club", according to Simpson. For the first
time in her career Simpson is co-writing and co-producing her
own material; she registered a number of new songs on the
website for the ASCAP and is also the executive producer of
the album.
Simpson also expanded her market in the fashion world by
announcing the release of her shoe collection to be released
in major department stores across the US starting in February
2006. She is also featured in a new Pizza Hut commercial for
their new Cheesy Bites Pizza, singing a variation of "These
Boots Are Made For Walkin'" called "These Bites Are Made For
Poppin'" The commercial also features a short cameo appearance
by Kermit the Frog and Miss Piggy.
Jessica has also started filming her second movie Employee of
the Month, with Dane Cook, in New Mexico, as well as being
signed on to star in her third movie, Major Movie Star.
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