Sarah Michelle Gellar (born April 14, 1977) is an American actress. She is probably best known as Buffy Summers in the acclaimed television series Buffy the Vampire Slayer, for which she received a Golden Globe Award nomination. She won a Daytime Emmy Award for her role in All My Children. She has since become known as a film actress, having starred in the family film Scooby-Doo (2002) and the sequel Scooby-Doo 2: Monsters Unleashed (2004), the romantic comedy Simply Irresistible, the independent film Harvard Man (2001), the teen drama Cruel Intentions (1999) and the horror films The Return (2006), The Grudge 2 (2006), The Grudge (2004), I Know What You Did Last Summer (1997) and Scream 2 (1997). She was in the tv movie Beverly Hills Family Robinson (1998).
She also provided the voice of April O'Neil in the film TMNT and Ella (better known as Cinderella) in the film Happily N'Ever After.
She has also starred in several films that have yet to be released, including Southland Tales, The Air I Breathe, Suburban Girl and Addicted which according to some reports has been renamed to Possession.. She is attached to the film version of the video game American McGee's Alice.
Gellar was born in New York City, the only child of Rosellen Greenfield, a nursery school teacher, and Arthur Gellar. Both of her parents were Jewish, though Gellar's family had a Christmas tree during the holidays while she was growing up. In 1984, her parents divorced and she was brought up by her mother on the Upper East Side.
Gellar was estranged from her father from this time until his death from liver cancer on October 9, 2001. She attended New York's Columbia Grammar & Preparatory School and the Professional Children's School. Gellar held a straight-A average and became a competent figure skater. Her best friend was Melissa Joan Hart, who later was the star of the series Sabrina, the Teenage Witch.
Gellar met future husband Freddie Prinze Jr. during filming of the 1997 teen horror film I Know What You Did Last Summerbut the two did not begin dating until 2000. They were engaged in April 2001 and married in Mexico on September 1, 2002 in a ceremony officiated by Adam Shankman, a film director and choreographer with whom Gellar had worked on Buffy the Vampire Slayer.
In 2004, while filming The Grudge in Japan, Gellar visited the famous Japanese swordsmith Shoji Yoshihara (Kuniie III) and bought a Katana from him as a birthday present for her husband. Gellar realized that she needed clearance from the government to remove the sword from the country, and after eventually succeeding, stated that it was "incredibly difficult" to do.
Gellar has said in interviews that she believes in God but does not belong to an organized religion. Gellar has also said in interviews that she collects rare editions of classic children's literature.
