Jaime Elizabeth Pressly (born July 30, 1977) is an American actress and model, best known as Joy on the NBC sitcom My Name Is Earl. She was nominated for an Emmy for Outstanding Supporting Actress In A Comedy Series in 2006 and 2007; for a Screen Actors Guild Award in 2006; and for a Golden Globe Award in 2007.In 2007 she won the Emmy for Outstanding Supporting Actress In A Comedy Series.
Early life:Pressly was born in Kinston, North Carolina, the daughter of Brenda Sue (née Smith), a dance instructor. She has two siblings: sister Jessica and brother James Liston Jr. Pressly spent 11 years studying gymnastics and dancing.
By the time she was fourteen, she was the spokeswoman for her modeling agency "International Cover Model Search", and she had begun to gain recognition for her modeling in the USA, as well as in Italy and Japan.
Pressly attended Costa Mesa High School in California, where her mother had moved while her parents were going through the process of a divorce. Pressly subsequently sought and succeeded in having herself legally emancipated from her parents at the age of 15 so she could attend a modeling job in Japan; neither one of her parents could attend with her, so she had to be emancipated to go on her own.
Personal life:Friends for nine years since 1996, she started dating DJ Eric Calvo (aka DJ Eric Cubiche) in 2004. After becoming pregnant, the two became engaged in October 2006. Pressly gave birth on May 11, 2007 at 7:31 a.m. in Cedars-Sinai Medical Center to their first child Dezi James Calvo. In a February 2007 interview on The Tonight Show With Jay Leno, Pressly said she wants the child to be bilingual (English/Spanish) to reflect Calvo's Cuban heritage. Pressly told People magazine the name is part of a running joke, as Cuban-American Calvo does a Desi Arnaz impersonation, calling Pressly "Luuucy" when he comes home at night In November 2008 the couple split up.
Pressly said in a 2006 interview with Esquire magazine that she almost purchased a ticket for a flight on one of the planes that crashed into the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001, but decided not to take the flight because she felt it left too early in the morning.In July 2009, Pressly became engaged to entertainment lawyer Simran Singh. They married on September 26, 2009 at the Dick Clark Estate. Guests, including Pressly's 2-year-old son Dezi James, attended the ceremony on a bluff overlooking the Pacific Ocean.
