Zooey Deschanel Biography

American actress Zooey Deschanel was born in 1980 in Los Angeles, California. That Zooey would grow up to become an actress is little surprise; she was immersed in the world of entertainment through her father, cinematographer Caleb Deschanel and her mother, actress Mary Jo Deschanel. Zooey traveled with her father on location throughout her childhood, and the experiences had an indelible effect on her upbringing; by the time she was in her early teens, she knew she wanted to be an actress.

Zooey’s early credits include small roles on television and in film, until in 2000 she was cast in a supporting role in Cameron Crowe’s film Almost Famous. The film was critically lauded, and Deschanel’s performance along with it, setting the stage for appearances in The Good Girl, Abandon, The New Guy, House Hunting, and All the Real Girls, which earned Deschanel a Mar del Plata International Film Festival award for Best Actress and a nomination from the Independent Spirit Awards.

It was in the 2003 film Elf that Zooey’s fans first got a glimpse of her voice and talent for music, with her stunning rendition of the classic “Baby, It’s Cold Outside.” Between 2003 and 2008, Deschanel appeared in a number of films, including Eulogy (2004), The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy (2005), Failure to Launch (2006), and Bridge to Terabithia (2007), but during this time she was also preparing for her debut as a singer. Her first album, aptly titled Volume One, arrived in 2008, and has since been followed by the albums Volume Two (2010), A Very She & Him Christmas (2011), Volume 3 (2013), Classics (2014), and Christmas Party (2016.) She also sang in a number of films, including five songs from the film Yes Man (2008), one song included in the film 500 Days of Summer (2009), and three songs from the 2011 film Winnie the Pooh.

Today, Zooey Deschanel is best known for her Emmy-nominated role on the hit television series New Girl. Her most recent film role, in the animated feature Trolls (2016), features her vocals on the songs “Hello,” “I’m Coming Out,” “Mo Money Mo Problems,” and “Can’t Stop the Feeling!”