Cameron Diaz: Snapshot
- Name
- Cameron Diaz
- Birth Date
- August 30, 1972
- Birth Place
- San Diego, Calif.
Diaz's work runs the gamut from action flicks (Charlie's Angel's) to more serious fare (Gangs of New York) and even animation (Shrek), helping her become one of Hollywood's most powerful and highest-paid actresses. As for her personal life, after quietly dating Matt Dillon and Jared Leto, the blonde beauty dated younger pop star Justin Timberlake for nearly four years.
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Cameron Diaz: Five Fun Facts
- If she'd been a boy, Cameron Diaz said her parents would have named her Menachem El Genio or Sebastian Emilio. "Luckily, I was a girl," she told PEOPLE in 1994.
- A heavy-metal fan, Cameron Diaz went to her first Van Halen concert as a teenager with her mother. "I banged my head quite a bit," she told Harper's Bazaar. "I liked everything from Iron Maiden to Ozzy to AC/DC."
- Cameron Diaz's mega-curves in her first movie, The Mask, were courtesy of a $36 Frederick's of Hollywood padded bra.
- "I'm technophoboic," Cameron Diaz told the Houston Chronicle. "I think technology is a really terrifying thing and it is going to cause a lot of problems for our society, socially. I don't have a computer and I don't know how to turn one on."
- According to There's Something About Mary director Peter Farrelly, during the movie's driving range scene Cameron Diaz "had a better swing than the double we hired to stand in for her. And the double was a college golfer."
Cameron Diaz: Biography 
- 1989
A Star Discovered
Photographer Jeff Dunas spots 16-year-old Diaz at a party and offers to help her land modeling work. Within days she has a contract with Elite and shortly thereafter is working for clients such as Coca-Cola and Nivea. "She has an energy, an electricity in her face, a sparkle that is unmistakable," Dunas tells PEOPLE in 1998.
- 1990
Dating in the Workplace
While shooting an ad for L.A. Gear, Diaz falls for video producer Carlos de La Torre, 27. "I spent the entire day trying to get him to talk to me," she tells PEOPLE in 1994.
- 1994
First-Movie Jitters
Diaz hits the big screen in the Jim Carrey comedy The Mask. The model, whose only acting experience was in a high school drama class, "tried out as a joke," according to her agent, Robin Levy. Diaz lands the part after 12 callbacks. Still, "the first day was hell," Diaz tells PEOPLE. "When Carlos was driving me to the studio it was like, 'Babe, pull over. I'm going to throw up.'"
Photo Credits
Top Left: Evan Agostini/Getty
BIOGRAPHY (top to bottom): Classmates Yearbook Archives; Ted Soqui/Corbis Sygma; Everett
