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Tia Carrere (born January 2, 1967) is an American Grammy nominee, actress, model, and singer, perhaps most widely known for her role as Cassandra in the feature films Wayne's World and Wayne's World 2 and in the TV series Relic Hunter. Exotic Chinese, Spanish, Filipino, sultry actress who gained national prominence as Cassandra, the guitar-playing, kick-boxing "babe" in the 1992 mega-hit, "Wayne's World". Carrere began working as a model and commercial actress which led to her being cast in a number of guest spots on such series as "The A-Team" and "MacGyver". She made her feature debut in the B-horror film, "Zombie Terror" (1987). Much of Carrere's early film work consisted of playing "the girl" in such action fodder as "Showdown in Little Tokyo" (1991) and "Fatal Mission" (1990). Carrere was able to display her comic and musical abilities in "Wayne's World", (for which she sang two songs), and was given a chance to show a more cerebral side when cast as Jingo Asakuma, a half-Japanese, half-black computer expert in Philip Kaufman's thriller "Rising Sun" (1993). Carrere was born Althea Rae Duhinio Janairo in Honolulu, Hawaii, the daughter of Audrey, a computer supervisor, and Alexander Janairo, a banker. She is of Filipino, Chinese, Spanish and Hawaiian ancestry. Carrere longed to be a singer as a child. Although she was eliminated during the first round of her 1985 Star Search appearance at the age of 17, she was spotted by the parents of a local producer while shopping at a Waikiki grocery store and was cast in the b-movie Aloha Summer. Following this initial success, Carrere relocated to Los Angeles and, after working several months as a model, landed a first ever role in the U.S. TV series Airwolf in early 1985. Her first major break though was in the daytime soap opera General Hospital. She played the role of Jade Soong Chung from 1985 to 1987. She also had a guest appearance on The A-Team, which was supposed to lead to her joining the cast. Unfortunately, her General Hospital obligations prevented her from joining the team. Her character was dropped after one episode, and was never mentioned again. She also made guest appearances on the shows MacGyver ("The Wish Child") as a sexy karate instructor as well as a different assassin character in a later episode ("Murderer's Sky"), on Anything But Love as the adopted daughter of Marty Gold (Richard Lewis), and Married... with Children as Piper Bauman, a rival of Kelly Bundy's who attempted to steal a modeling job from her. After appearing in the 1991 action films Harley Davidson and the Marlboro Man and Showdown in Little Tokyo, she emerged into the public spotlight when cast as Cassandra, a rock singer and love interest of Mike Myers' character Wayne in Wayne's World (1992) - a role she reprised the next year in Wayne's World 2. A trained singer, Carrere performed all of her own songs in the two films, and the Wayne's World soundtrack features her vocals. She turned down a role in Baywatch to audition for Wayne's World. In 1992 People magazine named her to its annual "50 most beautiful people" list. Carrere's career trajectory continued on course with appearances in "Wayne's World 2" (1993) and director James Cameron's spy action thriller "True Lies" (1994), in which she played the villainous Juno Skinner opposite Arnold Schwarzenegger and Jamie Lee Curtis. But the actress soon began accepting leading roles in lesser movies, appearing in a string of routine (or worse) thrillers and comedic misfires. She teamed with her husband, Los Angeles restaurateur-turned-movie-producer Elie Samaha to try to craft vehicles for herself, but garnered little attention save for a reality-based indie film "20 Dates" (1998), in which she goes out on an on-camera date with filmmaker Myles Berkowitz (despite being married to the film's producer, a union that ultimately dissolved in 2000; Samaha would later go on to become a major Hollywood player). In 1999 she took the lead role in the syndicated action-adventure television series "Relic Hunter," playing globe-hunting, black-belted archeology professor Sydney Fox. The series aired internationally until 2002, the same year Carrere's career got a shot in the arm with a role that did not trade on her exotic good looks; instead, her smooth voice breathed life into Lilo's struggling older sister Nani in Disney's Hawaiian-themed animated feature film "Lilo & Stitch." Still, Carrere had not entirely embraced family-friendly fare: having scrupulously avoided nude scenes in the past despite her sex symbol status, she appeared undraped in a major pictorial feature in the January 2003 issue of Playboy Magazine. On November 22, 1992, Carrere married Italian/Lebanese producer Elie Samaha (she has since appeared in several of his films - none of which have achieved widespread success). Other roles in prominent films followed her role in Wayne's World, however, including the parts of terrorist Juno Skinner in True Lies (a 1994 Arnold Schwarzenegger action film), a mixed African-Japanese computer expert in Rising Sun (a thriller written by Michael Crichton starring Sean Connery and Wesley Snipes), robber Gina Walker in The Immortals (1995), and secretary Victoria Chappell in High School High (a 1996 parody). From 1999 to 2002, Tia Carrere starred as archeology professor Sydney Fox in Relic Hunter, a syndicated action-adventure series strongly reminiscent of the Indiana Jones and Tomb Raider films and video games. At this time, Carrere was featured in lad mag Maxim magazine. Relic Hunter lasted for a total of three television seasons before its cancellation. Carrere then provided the voice of Lilo's sister "Nani" in the animated film Lilo and Stitch (2002) and its spinoffs, as well as the voice of Queen Tyr'ahnee from the 2003 Duck Dodgers animated series. She also starred as Ari, a space marine-turned pirate in the 1995 adventure/puzzle game The Daedalus Encounter. Once interest in Carrere was renewed after the spread, she began a recurring voiceover role as the Martian Queen on the animated “Duck Dodgers” (Cartoon Network, 2003-2005). She returned to live action with a leading role in the Lifetime movie “Torn Apart” (2004), playing a doctor whose husband and daughter are kidnapped by a vindictive madman, forcing her to choose who will live and who will die. In “Supernova” (Hallmark Channel, 2005), she was a tough government agent assigned to guard over a young scientist (Luke Perry) who discovered that a meteor struck the sun, which will result in a catastrophic supernova. After appearing alongside Ving Rhames and Ja Rule in the redemption drama, “Back in the Day” (BET, 2005), Carrere joined eight other stars in an effort not to embarrass themselves on “Dancing with the Stars” (ABC, 2005- ), a live ballroom dancing competition that paired celebrities with professional dancers to perform the Quickstep, Fox Trot and Paso Doble, among other dances. Carrere displayed beauty, grace and charm during the course of her run, but was voted off midway through the competition. She participated as a contestant on the popular reality show Dancing with the Stars but after landing on her bottom more than once, she was eliminated on February 3, 2006, placing 6th in the competition overall. Despite using a body double for her sex scenes in Showdown in Little Tokyo, and her often expressed aversion to on-screen nudity, Carrere posed nude for the January 2003 issue of Playboy magazine. The photos were re-published in the German December 2006 issue of the magazine. In 2007, she was set to have a recurring role on Curb Your Enthusiasm. On October 17, 2007, Carrere appeared in an episode of Back to You. On October 30, 2007, Carrere appeared in the season premiere of Nip/Tuck. Carrere has continued to nurture her singing career. In 1993, her first solo album, Dream, was released, and went platinum in the Philippines. That same year, she was featured on the soundtrack of Batman: Mask of the Phantasm, performing the ending theme, "I Never Even Told You". In August of 2003, Carrere was awarded a Lifetime Achievement Award by Philippine president Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo. Her second album, Hawaiiana, was released in June 2007 and takes Carrere back to her Hawaiian roots with two-time Grammy Award winner Daniel Ho accompanying her on classic solo slack-key guitar and ukulele. The album was nominated for a 2008 Grammy Award under the category Best Hawaiian Music Album. Carrere divorced her husband Elie Samaha in February of 2000. On December 31, 2002, she married again, this time to photojournalist Simon Wakelin. They have a daughter, Bianca, born September 25, 2005. At present, she lives in Toronto, Canada. |
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