Jenny McCarthy Pictures, Biography, Images, Videos, News

From Playboy centerfold to author of best-selling parenting books, Jenny McCarthy enjoyed one of Hollywood’s more unusual career trajectories. While appearing on popular shows on MTV in the 1990s, legions of fans fell head over heels for the blue-eyed blonde’s unladylike penchant for scatological humor and her fearless, unbridled goofiness. That appeal was not enough to draw steady audiences to her short-lived NBC prime time sitcom “Jenny,” but nonetheless she was tapped for feature film appearances in broad fare like “Scream 3” (2000) and “Scary Movie 3” (2003), which generally banked on her tightly-clad physique. After chronicling her pregnancy and birth in a pair of well-received “tell-it-like-it-is” books, McCarthy’s son was diagnosed with autism; she became an ardent activist on the vexing disease, earning a new kind of respect for her passion in getting to the bottom of one of the most puzzling medical issues of the day.
The second of four daughters raised by a steel mill worker and beautician on Chicago’s South Side, Jenny McCarthy was born on Nov. 1, 1972. Her sisters were all highly accomplished athletes but McCarthy was the family ham, harboring dreams of a showbiz career from the time she was young. After high school, she chose to pursue nursing and psychology at the University of Southern Illinois, but ran out of tuition money after her second year. After an unsuccessful attempt to make money as a model – she was told she was too voluptuous to work the runways – McCarthy approached Playboy magazine as a last ditch effort. Within a few months, she was Miss October (1993) and went on to earn the title of “Playmate of the Year.” With her earnings — about $100,000 — she headed to L.A. to pursue a career in entertainment.