Rachael Leigh Cook Biography

Rachael Leigh Cook was born on October 4, 1979, in Minneapolis, Minnesota. She is the daughter of Thomas H. Cook, a social worker and former stand-up comedian, and Joann, a cooking instructor and weaver.

At the age of 7, Cook was first seen in a public service announcement for foster care. Soon she started working as child print model and was seen nationwide in advertisements for Target and also appeared on the boxes of Milk-Bone dog biscuits.

Rachael Leigh Cook began auditioning for acting work when she was fourteen. Clearing the auditions, she made her debut in the 1995 film ‘The Baby-Sitters Club’. The movie was based on Ann M. Martin’s book series by same name.

Her next movie was ‘Tom and Huck’ where she played the role of Rebecca ‘Becky’ Thatcher. In 1996, she was seen in the short film ’26 Summer Street’. The following year, Cook played the role of a fifteen year old rape victim who gets impregnated by her rapist in the film ‘Country Justice’.

After the box office failure, Cook decided to focus her attention only on independent films. Due to her decision, she was often nicknamed the next ‘Indie Queen’ after actress Parker Posey.

Apart from acting, Cook has also been a model and has appeared on the covers of many magazines. In 2000, she appeared in the US issue of FHM in the March/April issue. The same year, she starred in music videos for New Found Glory’s single ‘Dressed to Kill’, and singer Daniel Powter’s ‘Love You Lately’.

She provided her voice for Chelsea Cunningham in the animated series ‘Batman Beyond’ for the episode ‘Last Resort’, and also in another animated film ‘Batman Beyond: Return of the Joker’. In 2005, she was featured in the television miniseries ‘Into the West’ which was produced by Steven Spielberg and Dreamworks.

Rachael Leigh Cook is also the owner of her own production company, Ben’s Sister Productions which is in reference to her younger brother, Ben Cook.

In 2017, she appeared in the TV movie ‘Summer in the Vineyard.’ She also starred in ‘A Midsummer Night's Dream,’ which earned positive reviews.

Rachael Leigh Cook’s career has covered several genres of the entertainment industry. She has appeared in movies, TV series, advertisements, video games, music videos, and has also done modelling. But the most popular movie of her career has to be ‘She’s All That’ which was a teen romantic comedy movie. It was one of the most popular teen films of the 1990s, and had reached number one position at the box office in just one week of its release.

In August 2004, Rachael Leigh Cook married actor Daniel Gillies. Together they have two children: a daughter Charlotte Easton Gillies who was born in September 2013, and son Theodore Vigo Sullivan Gillies who was born in April 2015.

Rachael Leigh Cook and Daniel Gillies parted ways in 2019, and got divorced in 2021. She is said to be dating Kevin Mann. 

In 2012, she started to grant scholarships to students in the age group of fourteen to nineteen to help them pay for the career classes, school fees and mentoring programs.