For a while, she worked in theatre (including a Broadway production of Arthur Miller's A View from the Bridge in 1997) and television. Amy Heckerling's witty, well-received film, based loosely on Jane Austen's Emma, was a charmer which regarded its often superficial characters with genuine warmth it was also a surprise box-office success, launching the careers of several of its youthful cast (Alicia Silverstone, Paul Rudd and Donald Faison).Ī film career did not follow immediately for Murphy. More television and advertising work followed before she was picked to play Tai, the new girl at a Beverly Hills high school, in Clueless. Later she claimed to have spent most of her youth cajoling her mother into decamping with her to Hollywood to further her career, but when Murphy began notching up advertising jobs after auditions in New York, mother and daughter did indeed move to Los Angeles.Īt 14, Murphy became a regular on the sitcom Drexell's Class (1991-92), about a white-collar criminal who makes a new start as a teacher. By the age of five, she was a member of a school of dance and theatre. She was born in Atlanta, Georgia, and after her parents divorced she moved with her mother, Sharon, to Edison, New Jersey. She claimed to draw no distinction between the various characters she played, describing them as "all using my tears and snot and sweat and bruises, just in different contexts … There are probably 800 people living inside of here, so they all pop out in different ways.
She demonstrated her versatility in dramatically intense films such as Girl, Interrupted and 8 Mile. In her first substantial role, as a greenhorn mentored by the coolest girl in school in the 1995 hit Clueless, she proved herself an inventive exponent of comedy.
It certainly was not much of a stretch to imagine her evoking the gusto and vulnerability required for that part. In this case, it was Piece of My Heart, for which Murphy auditioned successfully in 1999, but which was never made. Brittany Murphy, who has died unexpectedly aged 32, was one of several performers over the years who were attached to one Joplin biopic or another. In 'Just Married,' Murphy and Kutcher played spouses, and plenty of headlines advertised their romance afterward - which means Brittany may have already been dating Ashton when people began poking around for information about Eminem.It has become something of a rite of passage for any young actress fresh on the Hollywood scene to be pencilled in to play Janis Joplin. The interesting thing is that she made those remarks in an interview alongside Ashton Kutcher, for the film they began working on right after '8 Mile' wrapped. Still, Murphy did gush about what a hard worker Mathers was, and how funny and honest he was. In fact, in one interview, she used a line from another of her films ("I'll never tell") when asked whether she and Marshall Mathers became an "off-screen item." Still, she wasn't averse to joking about it when pestered in interviews. RELATED: 9 Urban Legends Of Women Eminem Secretly Dated (And 6 He Actually Did)Īs many times as she was asked about it, if Brittany really did hook up with the rapper, she clearly wasn't about to spill the beans. At least, not in a recorded interview that's still around today. Though she took a lot of seemingly good-natured ribbing after playing Eminem's on-screen love interest, Brittany doesn't seem to have claimed to have dated her co-star. Some sources suggest that at one time, Brittany Murphy did admit to having a brief fling with Eminem.
Did Brittany Murphy Admit She Dated Eminem?