Danica McKellar
Danica McKellar
Danica Mae McKellaris an American actress, author, mathematician, and education advocate. She played Kevin Arnold's on-off girlfriend Winnie Cooper in the television series The Wonder Years, and later wrote four non-fiction books: Math Doesn't Suck, Kiss My Math, Hot X: Algebra Exposed and Girls Get Curves: Geometry Takes Shape, which encourage middle-school and high-school girls to have confidence and succeed in mathematics...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionTV Actress
Date of Birth3 January 1975
CitySan Diego, CA
CountryUnited States of America
I learned my French through school. I was lucky in that the tutor on 'The Wonder Years' set spoke fluent French.
I played Winnie Cooper on 'The Wonder Years' from ages 12-18, and did a few other movies during some of the summers.
I was born in San Diego, and we moved to Los Angeles when I was seven. A couple of years later, I started acting!
Look at Michelle Pfeiffer: My God, she's 50 years old, but she is still so sexy. If I were into women, I would be totally into her.
I took a break from acting for four years to get a degree in mathematics at UCLA, and during that time I had the rare opportunity to actually do research as an undergraduate. And myself and two other people co-authored a new theorem: Percolation and Gibbs States Multiplicity for Ferromagnetic Ashkin-Teller Models on Two Dimensions, or Z2.
People talk about 'getting rid of the old image', and I guess there's some merit in that. But the truth is that people loved 'The Wonder Years' - I can't turn my back on it.
I just did a spread in 'Maxim', I'm 35 years old. I've had women and parents email me asking if I should really be doing that, since I'm still considered a role model.
I've done a lot of surveys and interacted with a lot of students, and I was shocked to see that at 12 years old, girls are already talking about dumbing themselves down.
It's such a diversion to be constantly thinking of better ways I can teach people math that my hunger is for that really, for new ways of translating the beauty of it.
I've always been really cautious about guys who have a Winnie Cooper fantasy, and I'm so glad about that. I mean, I can count on one hand the guys I've been with. It was really challenging, but I never gave it up too soon, if you know what I mean.
When girls are asking themselves 'Who am I?' for the first time and they hear all this bad PR about math, they think, 'Well, whoever I am, I'm not somebody who likes math.'
Acting is my first love, and that's my main career, it really is.
I am definitely a serial monogamist. I can count on one hand the number of guys I've been with.
I exercise at home - light cardio and yoga.