Early life

Hayden Lesley Panettiere was born on August 21, 1989, in Palisades, an unincorporated hamlet in Rockland County, New York.[2][3] She was the eldest child of Lesley R. Vogel, a former daytime television soap opera actress, and Alan Lee “Skip” Panettiere, a captain in the New York City Fire Department (FDNY).[4] She was of Italian, German, and English lineage. Her surname is of Italian origin, meaning ‘baker’, and was passed down from her paternal step-grandfather who adopted her father; her family pronounces the name “pan-a-teery”.[5] Her maternal grandparents lived in Indiana, where she spent extended periods during her childhood.[6] She had a younger brother, Jansen Panettiere, who also was an actor and visual artist; he died in February 2023 at age 28 from aortic valve complications related to cardiomegaly.[7]

Panettiere initially attended South Orangetown Middle School in Blauvelt, New York. When her acting commitments grew to be demanding, she finished middle school and left traditional classroom schooling after eighth grade. From ninth grade until graduating from high school, she was educated via homeschooling programs designed to accommodate her filming schedules.[8][9]

Career

1990–2005: Career beginnings

Panettiere first appeared on-screen at 11 months old in a 1990 Playskool toy train commercial.[10] Throughout her early childhood, she appeared in over 50 commercial advertisements, print campaigns, and promotional projects.[11] She landed a role as Sarah Roberts on the ABC soap opera One Life to Live from 1994 to 1997, followed by Lizzie Spaulding on the CBS soap opera Guiding Light in 1996 and again from 1997 to 2000. While on Guiding Light, Panettiere’s character Lizzie battled leukemia. The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society gave her its Special Recognition Award for drawing the attention of daytime viewers to the disease and for improving national awareness.[12]

Panettiere made her feature film debut at age nine as the voice of Princess Dot in A Bug’s Life (1998).[13] Her first released film was The Object of My Affection (1998) at eight, in which she appears briefly as a mermaid in the school play in the opening scene. In 1999, she played the girl on a sinking sailboat in Message in a Bottle. She provided the voice for Suri in Disney‘s CGI-animated movie Dinosaur (2000) and portrayed Sheryl Yoast in Remember the Titans (2000), a role that won her a Young Artist Award for Best Supporting Young Actress.[14] For her performance in Lifetime‘s If You Believe, she was nominated for the Young Artist Award for Young Actress Age Ten or Under in the category of Best Performance in a TV Movie or Pilot.[15] Panettiere appeared on Fox‘s Ally McBeal as the title character’s daughter, played the daughter of the main character Ruth Applewood in HBO Films‘ Normal, had a recurring guest role on Malcolm in the Middle, and guest starred on Law & Order: Special Victims Unit in two different roles. In 2004, Disney Channel gave Panettiere her first starring role as the daughter of Bill Pullman‘s character in Tiger Cruise.[16]

Panettiere voiced Kairi in Kingdom Hearts (2002).[17] In 2004, she appeared as a teenage girl caught in a fantasy transitional realm alongside fellow teen actor Ryan Kelley in The Dust Factory and the role of adolescent niece to Kate Hudson‘s title character in Raising Helen, where she portrayed an older sister of real-life siblings Abigail and Spencer Breslin.[18][19] In 2005, Panettiere starred alongside Michelle Trachtenberg as an ice-skating rival in Disney’s Ice Princess. Also in 2005, she played a jockey with a rising career, Channing Walsh, in Racing Stripes. She later reprised her role as Kairi in Kingdom Hearts II (2005) and Kingdom Hearts Birth by Sleep (2010).[16]

Panettiere often sang the soundtracks for the films in which she also starred. She was nominated for a Grammy Award in 1999 for A Bug’s Life.[20] In 2004, she recorded “My Hero Is You” for Tiger Cruise and “Someone Like You”, a duet with Watt White for The Dust Factory (both also with accompanying videos). The following year, she recorded “I Fly” for Ice Princess. She recorded a song for the Hollywood Records compilation Girl Next (2006) and another song titled “Go to Girl” for Girl Next 2 (2007). Also in 2007, she sang the U.S. National Anthem at A Capitol Fourth and recorded a cover for “Cruella De Vil” for Disneymania 5, “Try” for the Bridge to Terabithia soundtrack, and a ballad called “I Still Believe” for Cinderella III: A Twist in Time.[21]