By Jason
Amy Acker is the new star of "Angel" in which she portrays Winifred "Fred Burkle. Amy was born and bred in Dallas, Texas and is the oldest of four children. Amy's father is a Dallas lawyer while her mother is a housewife. Amy's ambition in life was to become a ballerina, however after injuring her knee during high school and having to have surgery her dream was shattered. Luckily however, Amy turned to acting during her sophomore year of high school and loved it, she even started to model.
Amy attended Southern Methodist University in 1996, as the theater department was supposed to be excellent. As part of her acting course, Amy was trained in weapons and certified combat, little did she know that she may get the chance to use these skills in her acting career. Her first television role was in the Wishbone company, which was used solely for the PBS television show Wishbone. In later years she continued her modeling career, travelling extensively to places such as Japan. She also performed in many plays such as: Beast on the Moon at Stage West, Measure for Measure and Apparent Wind. Amy was highly praised in her role in Therese Raquin and was nominated for Actress in a leading role in the 1999 Leon Rabin Awards. She also starred in the TV movie "To Serve and Protect" in 1999 and also received her Bachelor in Fine Arts in Acting in the same year.
After graduating from SMU, Amy worked at a Shakespeare theater called the American Players Theater for approximately eight months in Wisconsin. She had roles in "Much Ado About Nothing" and "The Master Builder" by Ibsen. After working for the American Players Theater, Amy moved to New York for eight months, still searching for roles in theater productions. In July 2000, Amy was cast in the play Talc, which was part of the 11th edition of the American Living Room Festival in Manhattan. Despite Amys wish to stay in theater she ended up being cast in a couple of independant films - The Accident and The Energy Specialist and also MTV's Hell House. After these experiences Amy changed her mind and set out in pursuit of an onscreen career. So she moved to Los Angeles in November 2000.
Amy had an easy transition from the New York lifestyle to the LA scene. Her agent from New York was also set up in L.A. and many of her friends from SMU were also in L.A. trying their luck. Before Amy auditioned for Angel, she worked on the sci-fi movie Groom Lake with William Shatner. At the end of the year 2000, Amy was finally cast for her role in Angel after reading for the part. Originally Amys role as Fred was only going to be a 3 episode deal, but Joss Whedon changed his mind and decided that Amy could be a valuable part of Angel's third season. Amy had a number of offers for other work including some pilots, but she decided that she would continue with Angel and started shooting the third season in July 2001.
During her free time Amy enjoys doing yoka, hiking and horseback-rides, also like Fred she enjoys Mexican. Amy currently resides in Los Angeles.
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