Katherine Heigl

Biography of Katherine Heigl

Katherine Marie Heigl was born on November 24, 1978 in Washington, D.C. She is an American actress and film producer.

Katherine Heigl, of German and Irish ancestry, is a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints ("Mormons") and describes herself as a devout. She is the daughter of Human Resources Manager Nancy (née Engelhardt) and Chief Financial Officer and Accountant Paul Heigl, and the youngest of four children. Her siblings are John "Holt", Margaret "Meg" (adopted) and Jason, who died in a traffic accident in 1986 at the age of 15. Her grandfather comes from Esslingen am Neckar.

A few years after her birth, her parents moved her and her siblings to Connecticut. At the age of nine, thanks to her aunt, she became a child model and appeared in several commercials.

In 1992, Heigl landed her first role in That Night opposite Juliette Lewis. A year later, Heigl starred in Steven Soderbergh's King of the Hill, before having her first starring role as Gérard Depardieu's daughter in 1994's My Father the Hero. In 1995 she played her next leading role opposite Steven Seagal in Under Siege 2.

After Heigl graduated from high school, she moved to Los Angeles with her mother in 1997. Heigl then played roles in Prince Valiant (1997) and Bride of Chucky(1998), among others. She starred in the sci-fi series Roswell from 1999 to 2002 and had a supporting role in Scream If You Can with Denise Richards in 2001.

Heigl is known to a wider audience for her role as Isobel Catherine "Izzie" Stevens on the television series Grey's Anatomy, which she played from 2005 to 2010. She won the 2007 Primetime Emmy for Best Supporting Actress in a Drama Series for this role and was nominated for a Golden Globe Award in 2007 and 2008.

In addition to her television presence, Heigl was able to push her cinema career forward again in 2007 with the comedy Knocked Up. In the years that followed, she also enjoyed starring roles in the romance 27 Dresses (2008) and the comedy The Ugly Truth (2009). In the same year she played the leading role in the film Life as we Know It. In 2014 and 2015, she was the lead actress on the short-lived NBC series State of Affairs. The series Doubt, starring Heigl, was canceled in 2017 after two episodes aired. She had been in Suits since 2018.

She has been married to singer Josh Kelley since December 23, 2007. In September 2009, the couple adopted a girl from Korea. In April 2012, it was announced that Heigl and Kelley had adopted another child. On December 20, 2016, she gave birth to a son.