Hayden Panettiere, Heroes Interview

[Emma]

Plain and simple, acting flows in Hayden Panettiere's blood. After getting her start in commercials at the ripe old age of 11 months, Hayden's career became an uphill climb in more ways than one. By the age of seven, Panettiere had already landed her second soap opera gig and by the time she was ready for high school, she had several film and television credits under her belt. Now, at 17 (she turns 18 on August 21, boys), Hayden Panettiere has almost become a household name overnight thanks to her role as cheerleader Claire Bennet on NBC's hit serial drama, Heroes.

Let's be honest, it's not every day that you find out you're invincible. After the high school quarterback tries to date rape Claire, a catastrophic car crash leads to her untimely death. Thanks to Claire's as-yet undiscovered "hero" power of regeneration, not even an autopsy could keep her down. In a lot of ways, Claire's regeneration and invulnerability meant TV had a new Wolverine (minus the claws and plus the sex appeal). After fans tuned in to the episode Five Years Later, though, the throngs of Heroes faithfuls discovered that even the blonde beauty (turned brunette in the future) can't withstand the awesome powers of Sylar, the show's main villain.

In order to become Claire Bennet, Hayden had to do more than simply look smokin' hot in a cheerleader's uniform, as she revealed in a recent conference call, "I think with all of our characters, it's been a learning process for us. We came in with one script and had to discover our characters, develop them and make them our own and really use what we bring to the table as actors."

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