Sarah Michelle Gellar (born April 14, 1977) was the leading actress in the television series Buffy the Vampire Slayer. She was born in New York City and has been acting since the age of 4, when she did a commercial for Burger King.
Gellar's major break was in 1992, in the teen soap opera Swan's Crossing. From there, she moved on to another soap opera, All My Children, for which, in 1995, at the age of eighteen, she won a Daytime Emmy Award for Outstanding Younger Leading Actress in a Drama Series.
Gellar left All My Children in 1995, and landed the lead in the highly successful Buffy the Vampire Slayer. The role made her a cult icon in the United States and elsewhere.
While continuing in that role, she attempted to capitalize on her television fame in order to create a career for herself in motion pictures. She has had only indifferent success. After small roles in the popular thrillers I Know What You Did Last Summer and Scream 2, Gellar starred in the disastrous flop Simply Irresistible. This film, rumored to be the last film ever watched by critic Gene Siskel, featured a magical crab and borrowed heavily from Like Water for Chocolate. Gellar's next film was the steamy Cruel Intentions, a modern-day retelling of Les Liaisons Dangereuses. She then went on a to a lead role in Harvard Man, a critical disaster that went straight to video.
Gellar finally found major box office success with Scooby-Doo, a live-action adaption of the cartoon series. Gellar has signed to make the sequel to the film, though critics blasted the first one.
During the Buffy the Vampire Slayer episode "Once More, With Feeling," which spawned an original cast album, Gellar sang in several of the songs: "Going Through the Motions," "I've Got a Theory," "Walk Through the Fire," "Something to Sing About," and "Where Do We Go From Here?"
On September 1, 2002, Gellar and actor Freddie Prinze Jr were married in Mexico.
Filmography
Television
