Portia de Rossi

Portia Lee James DeGeneres (born Amanda Lee Rogers; January 31, 1973), known professionally as Portia de Rossi (/ˈpɔərʃə də ˈrɒsi/), is an Australian actress, best known for her roles as lawyer Nelle Porter on the television series Ally McBeal and Lindsay Bluth Fünke on Arrested Development.

Bio

De Rossi grew up in Grovedale, a suburb of Geelong, Victoria, and modelled for print and TV commercials as a child. In 1988, at the age of 15, Rogers adopted the name Portia de Rossi, by which she remains best known; in 2005, she explained that she had intended to reinvent herself, using the given name of Portia, a character from William Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice. Her first significant role was playing a young and impressionable model in the Australian 1994 film Sirens. She attracted international attention when she joined the main cast of Ally McBeal in 1998, playing lawyer Nelle Porter. She remained with the show until its end in 2002.

From 2007–2008, de Rossi appeared in Nip/Tuck's fifth season as Julia McNamara's girlfriend Olivia Lord. In 2009 and 2010, de Rossi played the high-strung and controlling Veronica Palmer on the ABC show Better Off Ted. In 2011 she appeared in Better Off Ted cast member Malcolm Barrett's music video for "Revenge of the Nerds", spoofing her character Veronica in a cameo (alongside other cast members of the cancelled series).

In October 2012, de Rossi portrayed Lilly Munster in Mockingbird Lane the NBC reimagination of classic TV Show The Muneters. In July, 2014, ABC confirmed Portia de Rossi is joining season 4 of Scandal.

In late 2004 because de Rossi began dating Ellen DeGeneres. They were married at their Beverly Hills home on 16 August 2008.