Paula Patton

Paula Patton was born in Los Angeles, California, to Joyce (Vanraden) and Charles Patton. Her father is African American, while her mother is caucasian and has German, English and Dutch ancestry. Her family lived right across the street from the 20th Century Fox lot as she grew older, and she was a big fan of movies from her earliest days. Her mother was a school teacher and her father worked as an attorney. Paula admitted that she tried to escape as young girls through "pretending" to become someone else. So it's not a surprise that she was a part of Hamilton Magnet Arts High School plays. Her most loved role was "Abigail" from "The Crucible". However, she went on to take a course in film at the University of Southern California in a summer program, and got a 3-month job making documentaries for PBS. This meant that she could work as a production assistant for documentary films on TV as well as Howie Mandel's talk show. In the following time she was able to create documentary segments for Medical Diaries 2000 on Discovery Health Channel. Paula admits she is happy with what she does, but she still dreams of being an actor. She became a remarkably successful performer and, within three years of her debut, she had appeared in parts in major features, Hitch (2005) and Idlewild (2006) and was the female character in Deja Vu (2006) opposite Denzel Washington.