Hayden Panettiere, who has died at the age of 36, lived most of her life in the spotlight – from success as a child star to lead roles in hit TV shows Heroes and Nashville – but also endured struggles that went along with the pressures of fame.
Panettiere appeared in her first commercial when she was 11 months old. Her mother Lesley Vogel was an actress and set her daughter on the same path.
By the age of four, Hayden was in US TV show One Life to Live, then at eight joined another soap opera, Guiding Light.
Her natural acting ability was evident, but the burgeoning childhood career came at a cost.
“From a very young age, I lost the chance to have a normal childhood, friends, relationships, and my privacy,” Panettiere wrote in her revealing autobiography, This Is Me, which was published earlier this year.
She was “groomed” to be an actor, she told the Hollywood Reporter. “I was like a little soldier and I always have been. No was never an option.”
Panettiere’s career flourished and she soon earned roles like the voice of Princess Dot in Pixar’s A Bug’s Life in 1998, becoming one of the youngest ever Grammy Award nominees for the accompanying children’s read-along album.
She starred with Denzel Washington in American football drama Remember the Titans in 2000, and had roles in TV’s Ally McBeal and 2004’s Raising Helen with Kate Hudson.
When filming 2005’s Racing Stripes, a children’s film about a zebra who thinks it’s a race horse, she suffered a back injury when she fell off a zebra, and “over 20 years later, these injuries still bother me”, she wrote.
She also starred in 2006 cheerleading comedy Bring It On: All or Nothing, the third instalment in the Bring It On film series.
Also in 2006, she achieved a new level of fame when mysterious TV drama Heroes became a major hit.
Panettiere gave a likeably sparky performance as Claire, a cheerleader who regenerated if she was physically harmed, and who was at the heart of the show’s “save the cheerleader, save the world” plot.
The actress was 17 when it launched and the fame came with new levels of attention, including from swarms of paparazzi. They kicked her and said “appalling” things to attempt to get a reaction, she said, while one headline trumpeted a picture of her apparent cellulite.
“I suffered from body dysmorphia for years because of that, believing that no matter how strong, thin or young I was, there was no escaping the dreaded cottage cheese thighs.”
While working on Heroes, Panettiere suggested her mother should no longer be her manager. “I desperately wanted her to just be my mom,” the actress said.
“I also wasn’t expecting the reaction that I got, which was, ‘You owe me.’ That’s all she said, and she walked out.”
Panettiere returned to acting after a five-year break in 2023 in Scream VI, but suffered another major personal trauma the same year when her younger brother Jansen died, reportedly due to an enlarged heart.
She had to face more difficulties than most in her 36 years, and attempted to process them by writing her book, which was published in May.
“I’ve always strived to be a positive person, but I grieve all the hours I lost to addiction, my broken relationships, and my loved ones who are no longer here,” she explained. “I also know I’m not alone when I say that the fact my family fell apart still stings.
“I’ve spent years in treatment trying to make sense of these losses, and I’ve concluded that the only thing I can change is myself and the person I want to be.
“If only that was easy.”
She ended by telling readers she had accepted her past and had hope for the future, having learned to “walk hand in hand with my triumphs and my tragedies, because they have made me who I am”.