Biography And Filmography:

A New York born child actor who got her big break in the starring role in the 1996 movie "Harriet the Spy" (1996) with Rosie O'Donnell. Before her big-screen celebrity career took off, Michelle Trachtenberg had guest appearances in numerous television serials like "Law & Order", "Clarissa Explains It All" and "All My Children" with Susan Lucci. 

She has been acting since age six, when she broke into the business through television commercials. By the time she was eight, she was appearing on the Nickelodeon series "The Adventures of Pete & Pete" (1993), a peculiar show that looks at the lives and adventures of two red headed brothers with the same name. In 1998, she had a supporting role in "Richie Rich's Christmas Wish" (1998) starring the young David Gallagher, a story about getting blamed for spoiling Christmas and the richest kid in the world who wishes he'd never been born.

Her next role was in the comedy "Inspector Gadget" (1999) starring Matthew Broderick, a remake of the hit television series. Broderick stars as Gadget, who suffers an accident at the beginning of the film and befriends Brenda, a robotic surgeon who repairs Gadget so that he can defeat the villain Claw. 

Her celebrity profile was raised a bit in 2000, when she joined the ensemble cast of the popular cult series "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" in its last season working with Sarah Michelle Gellar to help her older sister in the fight against supernatural creatures. 

Next, she appeared in the teen sex comedy adventure “Eurotrip”, where dumped by his girlfriend, a high school graduate decides to go on an overseas adventure in Europe with his friends. She next starred in “Ice Princess” (2005) with Hayden Panettiere,  as a high school student who puts her Harvard ambitions on hold to pursue dreams of becoming a champion ice skater.

She then returned to television in "The Dive from Clausen's Pier" (2005) starring Will Estes, and had cameos on "Best Week Ever", "Six Feet Under", "House M.D." with Hugh Laurie, "Law & Order: Criminal Intent" and "Robot Chicken". She was then hired and cast in a supporting role in the comedy "Beautiful Ohio" (2006), starring William Hurt and directed by Chad Lowe, a story about a math genius, his relationship with his brother, and how an entire family comes of age during the early 1970s. 

She then co-starred in the horror thriller "Black Christmas" (2006), a remake of the 1974 horror movie "Black Christmas" (1974), about an escaped mad man who returns to his childhood home on Christmas Eve, which is now a sorority house, and begins to murder the sorority sisters one by one.

The actress finally got the role that made her famous when she co-starred alongside "High School Musical" celebrity Zac Efron in the comedy "Seventeen Again" (2008), about a guy whose life didn't quite turn out how he wanted it to and wishes he could go back to high school and change it. He wakes up one day and is seventeen again and gets the chance to rewrite his life. She then worked with Kiefer Sutherland and Lucy Lawless in the animated family adventure movie "Dragonlance: Dragons of Autumn Twilight" (2008), about a barbarian woman with a miraculous healing staff who gains the help of a group of  heroes as an army of dragons invades the land.

She next returned to television with a four episode deal in "Gossip Girl" (2008), where privileged teenagers attend an elite private school in New York City, and based on the Alloy Entertainment's book series. Next was another television movie with "The Circuit" (2008), about the dynamics between a father and his estranged daughter that spills over to the race track where the two go head-to-head. 

Then it was back to the big-screen in the family comedy "Kids In America" (2008) starring Topher Grace, where we follow an aimless college grad who pursues his dream girl at a wild Labor Day weekend party. He, his twin sister and their best friend struggle with their burgeoning adulthood over the course of the night.

The hot young Hollywood celebrity was now on the radar screen of every producer, as she had matured and grown into more adult roles, and showed she could carry a movie on her own. The actress wrapped her year in the dramatic "Against the Current" (2008) starring Joseph Fiennes, Justin Kirk and Mary Tyler Moore, about the story of a grieving man who sets out to swim the length of the Hudson River.