- Born
- Birth nameJennifer Ellen Chan
- Nicknames
- The Unabombshell
- Jenny
- Height5′ 7″ (1.70 m)
- An actress who always attracts audiences' attention, Jennifer Tilly is by turns funny, sexy, compassionate, compelling and often all at once. She has been playing unforgettable characters ever since she started her career as an actress.
Jennifer Tilly was born Jennifer Ellen Chan in Harbor City, Los Angeles, to Harry Chan, a used car salesman, who was of Chinese origin, and Patricia (née Tilly), a schoolteacher and stage actress. Her sister is actress Meg Tilly. They were raised on rural Texada Island, British Columbia, by her mother and stepfather, John Ward.
Jennifer successfully cultivated another fan base with the revitalization of the "Child's Play" horror comedy franchise. For Ronny Yu's Bride of Chucky (1998), the filmmakers turned to Jennifer to create the character who would spark the series in a new direction. She met the challenge and established a new horror icon in Tiffany. In Rogue Pictures' Seed of Chucky (2004), written and directed by series creator Don Mancini, Jennifer again took the popular series to the next level; starring as Tiffany and as herself, the deadly doll's favorite actress, who soon becomes an unwitting hostess in more ways than one.
Jennifer's pitch-perfect voiceover work as Tiffany is not the only instance of her being able to incarnate a character from the vocal chords out. Families know her distinctive cadences from the Disney hits Home on the Range (2004), directed by Will Finn and John Sanford; The Haunted Mansion (2003) (in which Jennifer acted from the neck up only), directed by Rob Minkoff; and the Pixar blockbuster Monsters, Inc. (2001) (voicing Mike's love interest Celia), directed by Pete Docter, David Silverman and Lee Unkrich. She began her acting career as a teenager, putting herself through the theater program at Stephens College in Missouri by winning writing competitions. She then headed to Los Angeles, California. While she continued to act on the stage (earning a Dramalogue Award for her performance in "Vanities"), movies and television immediately came calling for the actress with the unique voice and visage.
In 2001, she starred in the Broadway revival of "The Women" with Cynthia Nixon and Kristen Johnson, which was later taped for, and broadcast on, PBS. In 2008, she appeared with Miranda Richardson in the critically acclaimed production of Wallace Shawn's play "Grasses of a Thousand Colors" at the Royal Court Theatre in London. Other plays include "Tartuffe" (LAAT) "Boy's Life" (LAAT) "Baby with the Bathwater" (LAPT) and others too numerous to mention. In 2005, Jennifer met her boyfriend, professional poker player Phil Laak (also known as the Unabomber). That summer at the World Series of Poker, she bested a field of 601 to take down the Ladies Event and win a coveted gold bracelet. She followed this up by winning the WPT Ladies Invitational, making her one of a small but elite group holding both a WSOP bracelet, and a WPT title. In summer 2010, she also won the Bellagio Cup 5k tournament.- IMDb Mini Biography By: Nicole Perez, publicist
- SpouseSam Simon(October 1984 - March 1991) (divorced)
- ParentsPatricia TillyHarry Chan
- RelativesMeg Tilly(Sibling)Rebecca Tilly(Sibling)Steve Tilly(Sibling)
- Breathy, little girl voice
- Cheerful onscreen persona
- Voluptuous bombshell figure
- In 2005 she won the Ladies-Only No Limit Texas Hold 'Em event at the World Series of Poker, becoming the first celebrity to win an open (as opposed to celebrity-only) WSOP tournament and earn a World Series bracelet. She beat out exactly 600 other women to take the championship.
- Received her Bachelor's degree in Theatre from Stephens College in Columbia, MO.
- She has played a ditzy, sexy love interest for Kelsey Grammer's character Frasier Crane when he was trying to get over other women on Cheers (1982) and again on Frasier (1993) (though she was not playing the same character).
- Her father was of Chinese descent and her mother's ancestry was Irish, Finnish, and First Nations. Jennifer was raised mostly in British Columbia, Canada.
- Older sister of Meg Tilly and Rebecca Tilly, younger sister of Steve Tilly.
- Everyone said that if you want to be a real actor, go to New York. If you want to sell out, go to L.A. And I thought, "I want to sell out!"
- A way you can get really good abs in film is you get your makeup artist to paint shadows -- faux washboard. But if you see me in a movie and I have great abs, it means I have a great body double.
- Spending time with Jim on a stage is an incredibly weird experience! I found myself unable to act seriously! Hard to shoot with the master of comedy!
- I still haven't made a film that defines who I am.
- If I was like some of the characters I played, I'd probably be dead by now.
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