Birth Name: Amanda Leigh Moore
Birth Date: April 10, 1984
Birthplace: Nashua, New Hampshire
Parents: Don (Father), Stacey (Mother)
Ethnicity: English, Irish, Cherokee
Height: 5' 10" (178 cm)

Pre-Pop Music Singer: Before she took the music industry by storm, Moore lived life in relative anonymity. Moore was born in the small town, Nashua in New Hampshire, but her life there was short-lived. She spent most of her childhood in Seminole County, just outside of Orlando, Florida. She barely completed half a year of high school at Bishop Moore Catholic High School before joining the Texas Tech University correspondence program during her Backstreet Boys tour in 1999.

As a child, Moore always aspired to be a professional singer. Blessed with her talented voice, she was chosen to perform the US National Anthem at the beginning of several sporting events in Orlando. Music producers at one of the events took notice.

Rising Pop Music Singer: At the age of 14, after Moore was brought in to record a demo, she signed a record deal with Sony's Epic Records. That led to Moore's first album So Real, released on December 7, 1999. This album would launch the career of a young and budding star. Often associated with the likes of Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera, Moore's music features the same combination of pop and dance that caught on with young teenagers. Moore's second released album I Wanna Be With You featured much of the same style. Along with recording, Moore was invited to tour with the Backstreet Boys and N'Sync in 1999 to promote her album So Real, further increasing her rising stock. But a Moore started growing older; she took steps to figuring out her true identity.

Image Makeover: Sometime in early 2001, Mandy Moore re-evaluated her previous albums and was pleased with the success. However, she decided that the image she was portraying in those two albums and in her music videos "wasn't her." She chalked it up as young, teenage immaturity and wasn't comfortable performing that style of music and dance anymore. Determined to change her image, while also being more artistically in control of her music, changes were made to her upcoming album. In May 2001, Moore released her third album Mandy Moore, which featured songs with a noticeably different style. The motivation for the self-titled album may have been an attempt by Moore to declare her identity; that the songs in her album represent who she is as a person. Critics hailed the album as one of the more real and fulfilling pop albums on the market. Despite the success of her albums, Moore still felt something was missing in her life.

Mandy, the Actress? Wanting to try something new, Moore decided to dabble in the movie industry. After shooting The Princess Diaries, Moore caught the acting bug and subsequently began shooting more movies. She landed a lead in A Walk To Remember, which further cemented her growing maturity. Released a half year after her third album, Moore dyed her hair for the role. Now a brunette, Moore's life began to open up now that people didn't see her as the blond, pop princess from her early teenage years. The transition was as smooth a transition as anyone could hope for.

Return to Music: While shooting her 4th movie, How to Deal, Moore met rising tennis star, Andy Roddick, who was invited on the set of the movie at the insistence of Moore's mother. The two hit it off and Roddick, as Moore describes it, "stole her heart." The two began dating and soon it became one of the most high-profile relationships among the 12-34 demographic. The two were together for two years, but in 2003, the seams were beginning to fall apart. Suddenly, the two broke it off due to a number of reasons only known to them and those closet to them. Despite the relationship, Moore found time to shoot more movies, while balancing time with recording her fourth album. 

In mid-2003, Moore released Coverage, an album featuring songs that had the most influential effect from the 70's an 80's. Although this album sold only 293,000 copies, most of which can be blamed on the awful promotion by Epic Records, it would signal a change in Mandy Moore. The teenager who up until 2003 was known mainly for her pop albums So Real and movie, A Walk to Remember disappeared, replaced by a much more mature 20 year old. Coverage seemed to mirror that change and as a result, Epic Records may not have gotten the type of record that they were expecting from Mandy Moore, and I'm speculating here, but that could be the cause for the poor promotional effort since even I barely knew about it. It looks like Epic never had faith in the album. Not surprisingly, Epic and Mandy dropped their partnership, causing Mandy to search for the next phase of her life.

Where's Mandy? In the months after Coverage was released, Mandy Moore had a couple more movies coming out, Chasing Liberty and Saved! Both did relatively mediocre at the box office, but when you watch the movies, you can definitely see some of what makes Mandy Moore special. Chasing Liberty also starred Matthew Goode and that one guy from NCIS (Mark Harmon). Mandy played the elegant, but often mischevious Anna Foster, the president's daughter. The movie also featured a skinny dipping scene in the "Danube," which was a body double. In Saved! Mandy played the devout Christian, Hilary Faye. The role brought out a different side to what we usually see from her, since Hilary often displayed evil traits as a product of her devotion to Christianity. After these two movies, Mandy signed up for Romance & Cigarettes and Southland Tales. To this day, we are still waiting for their release. This caused Mandy a year-long absence from the mainstream media, since the movies she made were not making it to theaters. So in essence, Mandy disppeared for a bit, and when she finally returned to the big screen, we continued to see a changing Mandy Moore.

Zach Braff Era: After a nearly two year absence of Mandy Moore projects, fans finally were able to see her onscreen, this time on American Dreamz. During the time leading up to Dreamz, Mandy began dating Scrubs star Zach Braff and they had a relatively long relationship and it even led to Mandy appearing on a couple episodes of Braff's show. However, as with her relationship with Andy Roddick, it mysteriously ended and of course, there was much speculation about what happened. Meanwhile, in addition to American Dreamz, Mandy Moore revealed that she was returning to the recording studio with her new label, Sire Records, a division of Warner Brothers music. As of early 2006, there was much optimism about the pending album, code name: Slummin' in Paradise. It would be the first album that Mandy would personally pen. Everything looked like it was on track and everyone waited for an official release date. Unfortunately, as American Dreamz opened in April, there were also rumors that things weren't so great with Mandy and Warner Brothers music.

From the split to Wild Hope: Sandwiched in the middle of the music conflict was the release of Because I Said So in February 2007. The film ended up grossing over $40 million dollars in the U.S. and it exceeded A Walk to Remember in domestic earnings. However, the movie success did not translate to her music. According to several reports, Warner Brothers signed on with Mandy expecting she would produce more of a pop album. Mandy, not a teenager anymore, thought differently and they could not iron out the differences. In late May 2006, Mandy and Warner Brothers amicably parted ways and Mandy's future in the music business looked very cloudy. But then came July 7, 2006 where Mandy announced that she had signed with a new startup recording label, Firm Music. With this label, Mandy and producer John Alagia had the freedom to create the type of album that she intended to create. Through this process that was "like therapy" according to Mandy, she consulted with artists: Rachael Yamagata, Lori McKenna, and The Weepies. The product of their collaborations and her own artistic penmanship, comes Wild Hope.

Wild Hope and Beyond: The Firm released Wild Hope on June 19, 2007 and it got a relatively lukewarm response from the general audience. Mandy Moore fans were delighted that she finally came out with a new album, but it seems like it didn't attract the general population. The album peaked at #30 in the Billboard charts and it spent a total of 7 weeks on the charts. Album sales amounted to approximately 80,000 as of November, which is a disappointing number given Mandy Moore's singing talent.

Part of the reason for the poor response could have stemmed from a poor marketing strategy from the Firm. Their online presence has received the most criticism from fans as the Firm has chosen to publicize Mandy Moore through social networking profiles like Facebook and Buzznet, neither of which Mandy directly controls, instead of holding more public events where fans actually get the opportunity to meet the singer behind Wild Hope. Mandy did go on road, first in the West, then across other stops in the U.S. where she held her first concerts in several years. She was excited to be back on stage, but several stops failed to draw large crowds. However, in general, reviews for Mandy's performances on stage were good and critics liked the new direction that Mandy took with her music. But poor public relations with her fans and the failure to publicize the CD to the general population led to a disappointing album and it might affect future albums. Mandy could either turn her back on the music industry and focus on acting or she and the Firm can learn from their mistakes and strive to create a better album in terms of marketing. There was nothing wrong with the songs themselves.

Break: After completing her tour in October, Mandy Moore went on a personal break, which was very much deserved after a hectic 2-year run. She is currently not signed up for any movies and is not officially planning a new album. However, Southland Tales came out in November, two years after it was filmed, and it looks like it's gonna be the last movie featuring Mandy Moore for a while. This is a time for her to recharge her batteries and to hopefully gear up for another round of projects soon. Of course, the current writers strike has put a stop to new scripts, and could affect the number of new opportunities that Mandy usually gets in a year.

Last Updated: December 29, 2007

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