Hayden Panettiere is a singer and actress who was born on August 21, 1989 in Palisades, New York. The daughter of a fire department lieutenant and a soap opera actress, she also has a younger brother. Her earliest experience with acting work was when she was 11 months old, during an advertisement for the Playskool Toy Train. She later on had roles in a number of television shows, among them
Law and Order : Special Victims Unit,
Malcolm in the Middle , and
Heroes . Panettiere has also worked on feature films such as A Bug's
Life and Remember the Titans, as well as the Disney/Squaresoft video game series Kingdom Hearts. Additionally, her musical work has earned her a Grammy Award nomination.
Maddie Harrington is portrayed by Hayden Panettiere in the Fox network's Emmy Award-winning television comedy series
Ally McBeal .
(Photo courtesy of Hayden-Panettiere.com)