Jessica Simpson

Jessica Ann Simpson (born July 10, 1980) is an American pop singer and actress who rose to fame in the late 1990s. She has achieved seven Billboard Top 40 hits, and has three gold and two multi-platinum RIAA-certified albums. Simpson starred with her then-husband Nick Lachey in the MTV reality show Newlyweds: Nick and Jessica. She has also begun working as an actress, and is the older sister of Ashlee Simpson, a pop rock singer.

1999-2001: Rise to fame
1999 saw the arrival of pop princesses Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera, who each received multi-platinum certificates. Simpson's label hoped for the same with her. As 1999 came to a close, Simpson released her first single, "I Wanna Love You Forever," which peaked at #3 on the Billboard Hot 100. Soon afterward her album Sweet Kisses was released. Simpson toured with boy band 98 Degrees to promote her new album. She was given a role in the music video for 98 Degrees' hit song "My Everything," playing Nick Lachey's love interest. At that time she and Lachey began dating. After dating for two years the couple cooled their relationship, stating that the "break" allowed them to concentrate on their music careers. Then on September 11, 2001, Lachey was supposed to be flying out of New York City with his group 98 Degrees. When Simpson heard of the attacks on the nation coming from the airport she immediately phoned Lachey to learn his whereabouts. After this scare the couple rekindled the relationship.

Meanwhile, Simpson's album Sweet Kisses had gone double platinum thanks to the success of her follow-up singles "Where You Are", 1999, and "I Think I'm In Love With You, 2001." The latter became Simpson's biggest radio hit at that point and was her first release of an uptempo single. But although her debut album sold 2 million copies, sales fell far short of those achieved by Spears and Aguilera, and unlike the two pop princesses, Simpson was not a worldwide household name. Columbia Records officials reportedly decided Simpson needed a change for her second album.

In 2001, Simpson recorded a follow-up album with what Columbia considered more radio-friendly, up-tempo tracks; the studio also encouraged her to lose weight in order to fit in with her competitors. The result in that was Irresistible, released in mid-2001 on the heels of the title-track first single. The new sound and image helped make "Irresistible" one of the biggest hits of her career; it peaked at # 15 on the Hot 100. "Irresistible" debuted at # 6 in June 2001 on the Billboard 200 Album Chart, and has sold 825,000 copies to date.

2002: Marriage to Nick Lachey and TV success

During the summer of 2003, the reality show, Newlyweds: Nick and Jessica, starring Simpson and her new husband Nick Lachey began airing on MTV. Simpson's third album, In This Skin, was released in August of 2003 to coincide with the series premiere of Newlyweds.

The show quickly became a pop culture phenomenon and is credited with making her a household name, even among those who did not follow pop music or MTV. “I never knew that just doing the show would give me that pedestal to step on,” Simpson told Blender magazine in a March 2004 feature.

On May 30, 2004, Simpson was chosen to sing the National Anthem at the Indianapolis 500.

Later that summer, Simpson won three Teen Choice Awards: Female Fashion Icon, Choice Hottie Female, and Female Reality/Variety TV Star for Newlyweds.

Throughout the run of four seasons, Simpson epitomized the stereotypical dumb blonde, most notably when she asked Lachey whether the Chicken of the Sea tuna she was eating was in fact chicken or fish. She also indicated that she believed that buffalo wings were made from actual buffalo. She thought that platypus was pronounced as platymapus and then wondered whether the correct pronunciation was always platypus or platymapus as well. Her Hollywood brat behavior helped turn the show into a huge hit, with an average rating of roughly 1.4 million viewers, while reaching a series peak of approximately 4 million viewers.

The associated album, In This Skin, debuted at # 10 on The Billboard 200 album chart, with sales of 64,000 in its first week. It rebounded after a special collectors' edition was released in April 2004 and subsequently reached a peak of # 2. It was eventually certified quadruple platinum. It contained the hits "With You" (# 14, 2004) and a cover of the Berlin song "Take My Breath Away" (# 20, 2004), and a lesser hit, a cover of the Robbie Williams song "Angels", which charted just outside the Billboard Hot 100.

The couple starred in the television special The Nick and Jessica Variety Hour, which aired in 2004 and was compared to the Sonny and Cher show. Simpson released ReJoyce: The Christmas Album in late 2004, which peaked at # 14 on the album chart and was later certified gold.

In 2005, Newlyweds won a People's Choice Award for Favorite Reality Show before wrapping shortly after.