Paula Patton

Paula Patton was the daughter of Joyce (Vanraden), and Charles Patton. Her father is African American, and her mother is caucasian and is of German, English and Dutch origins. When she was growing up and her family lived in front of the 20th Century Fox lot. She was a fervent movie buff from the time she was a child. Her mom was a teacher and her father worked as an attorney. Paula admitted that she tried to escape as young girls through "pretending" to become someone else. So it's not a surprise that she appeared in Hamilton Magnet Arts High School productions. Her favorite character was one of Abigail in "The Crucible". After having graduated from the University of Southern California's summer school, she took film classes and was then given a 3 month task to produce documentaries for PBS. It led her to work as a production assistant on TV documentariesand for Howie Mandel's talk show. Later, she produced documentary segments for Medical Diaries (2000 on Discovery Health Channel). Paula states she loves what she is doing but her dream was still the same. She studied acting before deciding to switch gears and become a performer. She was almost immediately successful performing major roles in Hitch (2005), Idlewild (2006), and the lead female role in Deja Vu (2006) opposite Denzel.