Paula Patton

Paula Patton is the daughter of Joyce (Vanraden) Patton and Charles Patton. Her father is African-American, while her mother is caucasian and has German, English and Dutch ancestry. Her family lived right across from the 20th Century Fox lot when she was growing up , and she was a huge fan of movies since her earliest childhood. Her mother, who also loved good films, was a schoolteacher, and her father was a lawyer. Paula admitted that she tried to escape when she was an infant by "pretending" to appear to be someone different from herself. So it's not a surprise that she was a part of Hamilton Magnet Arts High School productions. Her favorite character was that of "Abigail" in "The Crucible". She continued her studies at the University of Southern California, where she completed a summer course in film. It was during this time that she was granted a three-month assignment to produce documentaries for PBS. As a result, she was able to serve as a production assistant on television documentaries as well as on Howie Mandel’s talk show. She progressed to actually producing documentaries for Medical Diaries (2000) airing on Discovery Health Channel. Paula says she enjoys doing what she loves, but she is still aspiring to be an actor. She became a remarkably successful performer and, in just three years, had played parts in major features, Hitch (2005) and Idlewild (2006) and the female lead in Deja Vu (2006) opposite Denzel Washington.