Hype: Jordan Ladd

by Louis Chunovic

Jordan Ladd's first role was one she was literally born to play: she portrayed the four-year-old vestion of her mother, Cheryl Ladd, on an episode of "Charlie's Angels". And with that performance she became the third generation of Ladds to hit showbiz.

Jordan's grandfather was legendary star Alan Ladd (of Shane fame); her uncle is Alan Ladd Jr. (affectionatly known inside the business as "Laddie"), who once ran MGM/UA and more recently produced such pictures as Braveheart; and her father, David Ladd, acted for years before segueing into producing (with The Serpent and the Rainbow).

Jordan herself began pursuing a big-screen career in earnest in the mid-90's at age 19. She quickly found herself cast in Gregg Araki's The Doom Generation--until her mom intervened. "I'd already started rehearsals and had my hair cut and dyed, and I woke up to my mom sitting on the foot of my bed crying and going, 'Sweetie, you can't do this movie. I don't think it's right.' She thought Gregg's material was too graphic."


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Araki didn't hold a grudge when the younger Ladd pulled out; in fact, two years later he cast her as a teen in his 1997 film Nowhere. She followed that with a part as one of the trio of vicious highschool girls who made life miserable for Drew Barrymore in Never Been Kissed.

Now 25, Ladd is currently starring in E! Entertainment's first original movie Best Actress, a satire of the cut-throat Oscar race. "I play Amber, the new face of Hollywood, you know she just started in that independent hit that everyone passed on," she says with a knowing shrug.

Offscreen, Jordan Ladd's mom is still dispensing showbiz advice, some of which perhaps only a mother could give: "She says, 'Treat auditioning like going to the bathroom. You walk in, you try, try, try as hard as you can and you do your thing. You flush, you walk out the door, you close it and you never look back.'"

Ladd didn't need her mom's advise when she was invited to read for a role in the big-screen version of Charlie's Angels. "I thought, 'I shouldn't do this, it'd just be too weird for me.' I said, "No!'"

Photographed by Paul Hernandez
Page 2 photograph courtesy of Regent Entertainment

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