This actress was born on March 24, 1977, in Sacramento, California.
She came into the world as Jessica Howard, the child of a vegan chef named Jerri Hastey and a firefighter named Michael Hastey. Her parents were both teenagers when she was born and by all accounts, the young girl wasn’t born into a privileged family.
She had previously shared with the Irish Times in 2017 about her “very difficult upbringing,” saying, “I did grow up with a single mother who worked very hard to put food on our table. We did not have money.”
“There were many nights when we had to go to sleep without eating,” she recalled. “It was a very difficult upbringing. Things weren’t easy for me growing up … Because of my mother, I do always try to think about how something must be for someone else. I’m not so interested in myself. I’m interested in other people.”
Bullied and told she was ”ugly”
Also, just so you know, her firefighter dad was actually her stepdad — her real father was Michael Monasterio, a rock musician who wasn’t around when she was a kid.
She also had a younger sister, and as children, the two “played outside until it was dark,” she recalled in an interview with The Guardian. They would wish “the light would stay longer, so you didn’t have to go home.”
For years, she remained private about her childhood — and understandably so.
Later in life, she remembered being bullied as early as age 8 because of her red hair and freckles.
”I was told every day at school that I was ugly,” she told Glamour. ”And that no one wanted to be my friend. The most cruel things.”
Tragically, in 2003, her sister died by suicide at their biological father’s home, and Michael Monasterio later passed away in 2013 from bronchitis.
When her father passed away, the award-winning actress didn’t attend tContinue reading…
