Jennifer Aniston

American actress who rose to international fame playing "Rachel," the sexy waitress on the immensely popular television comedy show Friends (1994-2004). She has since starred in various commercially successful comedy and drama films and TV series, and forged a parallel career as a film and TV producer. Aniston is the recipient of various accolades, including a Primetime Emmy Award, a Golden Globe Award and two Screen Actors Guild Awards. She has been included in various magazine lists of the world's most beautiful women and she is one of the world's highest-paid actresses.

The daughter of actor John Aniston, a star on the daytime soap Days of Our Lives, and his actress-model wife Nancy Dow, Jennifer and her brother Alexander grew up in a show business environment. Her godfather, the noted actor Telly Savalas, encouraged her to pursue her dream of being a "star." Most of her youth was spent in New York, although her family lived in Greece for a year. When she was nine years old, her parents’ marriage ended in divorce. At age 11, she joined the Rudolf Steiner School drama club, where she studied the creative arts, and during that same year, one of her paintings was displayed at the New York Metropolitan Museum of Art. Aniston later attended New York’s High School of the Performing Arts. After her graduation in 1987, she began working off-Broadway on productions like For Dear Life and Dancing on Checker’s Grave before making her television debut in 1989 in the show Molloy.

Although she had small parts on several short-lived TV shows and made guest appearances on others, she had little luck in Hollywood until her agent advised her to shed 30 pounds. Her weight loss apparently made a difference, because soon thereafter she won the role on Friends. Aniston then made a relatively successful transition to the big screen, appearing in several romantic comedies including She’s the One (1996), Picture Perfect (1997) and The Object of My Affection (1998).