Diagnosed with scoliosis at 12, Mckenna Grace kept filming hits until surgery became unavoidable. Here’s how she came back stronger. From Shirley Temple DVDs to Hollywood Mckenna Grace Burge was born on June 25, 2006, in Grapevine, Texas. She is the only child of an orthopedic surgeon and a medical sales representative. At 4, she fell in love with acting after her great-grandmother gave her a set of Shirley Temple films. At 5, she booked her first commercial. Early roles on Disney XD’s Crash & Bernstein and The Young and the Restless soon followed, and her family moved to Los Angeles. She never attended a regular school. She learned through…

Four years of auditions, zero roles. Then one homemade tape changed everything. The true story of Cailee Spaeny’s rise to a Venice best actress win. Cailee Spaeny: The Homemade Audition That Launched a Star Cailee Spaeny was born on July 24, 1998, in Knoxville, Tennessee, the seventh of nine children. She grew up in Springfield, Missouri, where she left school at 13 to focus on acting. She trained at Springfield Little Theatre up to six days a week, taking dance, voice and acting classes. In the 2014–2015 season, she played Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz there. Four Years of Hearing No In 2012, at 14, she convinced her parents…

Fired from her first TV job and stalled after Baywatch, Alexandra Daddario waited 20 years for her big break. Here’s the true story. She was fired from her first TV job as a teenager. Her biggest film role did not turn out the way she hoped. Then, after 20 years and more than 50 credits, one offer from a TV writer changed everything. A Soap Opera Firing at the Start Alexandra Daddario is born on March 16, 1986, in New York City. Both of her parents are lawyers, and her grandfather, Emilio Q. Daddario, served in the U.S. Congress for Connecticut. At 11, she decides she wants to be an…