Pauley Perrette

Pauley Perrette
Perrette at the 2014 AHA Hero Dog Awards
Born	(1969-03-27) March 27, 1969 (age 47) New Orleans, Louisiana, U.S.
Other names	Pauley P.
Occupation	Actress, singer, writer, entrepreneur
Years active	1994–present
Spouse(s)	Coyote Shivers (m. 2000; div. 2004)

Pauley Perrette (born March 27, 1969) is an American actress, best known for playing Abby Sciuto on the U.S. TV series NCIS. She is also a published writer, singer and civil rights advocate. Perrette also co-owns the "Donna Bell's Bake Shop" in Manhattan, which is named after her late mother.

Perrette was born in New Orleans and raised all over the southern United States. On The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson, she told host Craig Ferguson that she lived in Georgia, Alabama, Tennessee, North Carolina, South Carolina, New York, New Jersey, and California. In a 2011 interview with the Associated Press, Perrette confessed her early ambitions were to work with animals, be in a rock and roll band or be an FBI agent. She attended Valdosta State University in Valdosta, Georgia, where she studied criminal justice, and later moved to New York City to study at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice. While in New York she held a variety of jobs: "Not only was I bartending in club-kids scene, with a bra and combat boots and a white Mohawk, but I also wore a sandwich board on roller skates passing out flyers for Taco Bell in the Diamond District." Perrette also worked as a cook on a Manhattan dinner cruise boat.

Perrette has worked for years in television and film, mostly doing commercials, voice-overs, music videos and short films, and worked as a bartender in New York City. It was while working odd jobs in New York that a friend introduced her to an advertising agency director. From then on, according to Perrette, "I started booking commercials like crazy!" This prompted her move to Los Angeles, where she had a variety of bit parts and made several guest appearances. In 2001, as a recurring character introduced in season two of Special Unit 2, she played Alice Cramer, the Unit's public relations person. She then landed her current role, playing Abby Sciuto, an eccentric forensic scientist, on NCIS, a TV series based on the Naval Criminal Investigative Service. Perrette's initial appearances as the character were on two episodes of JAG aired in spring of 2003 that served as a backdoor pilot and introduced the characters. She has since appeared as Abby in two 2009 episodes of NCIS: Los Angeles, as well as an episode of NCIS: New Orleans in 2014. As of August 2011, she had the highest Q Score (a measurement of the familiarity and appeal) of any actor on a U.S. prime time show.