Jennifer Hudson

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Birth name Jennifer Kate Hudson
Nationality USA
Birth 12 september 1981 (42 years) at Chicago (USA)
Awards Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress

Jennifer Kate Hudson (born September 12, 1981) is an American singer, actress and spokesperson. She rose to fame in 2004 as a finalist on the third season of American Idol, coming in seventh place.

As an actress, she made her film debut portraying Effie White in Dreamgirls (2006), for which she gained worldwide acclaim and won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress, a Golden Globe Award, a BAFTA Award, and a Screen Actors Guild Award. She has also appeared in such films as Sex and the City (2008), The Secret Life of Bees (2008) and Winnie Mandela (2013). As a singer, Hudson won a Grammy Award for her debut album, Jennifer Hudson, released in 2008. The album spawned the hit single "Spotlight" and was certified gold by the RIAA, with sales exceeding a million copies worldwide. Her second album, I Remember Me, was released 2011 and was certified gold by the RIAA, producing the hit "Where You At".

In October 2008, after Hudson's mother, brother and nephew were killed in a shooting, Hudson stepped out of the public eye for three months. Hudson resumed her public appearances in 2009 and has since performed at the Super Bowl XLIII, the Grammy Awards, American Idol, and The Oprah Winfrey Show. Hudson has been described as a friend of President Barack Obama, who invited her to appear with him at a fundraiser in Beverly Hills in May 2009. She also performed at the White House at the "Celebration of Music from the Civil Rights Movement" event. Hudson has sold 1,280,000 albums and 2,237,000 singles in the United States as of February 2012. In 2013, she received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. She is a dramatic soprano, with the ability to sing from C3 to C#6.

Biography

Hudson began dating James Payton in 1999, when she was 18. They separated in late 2007. Hudson met David Otunga, a professional wrestler in the WWE and a Harvard Law graduate, and the couple became engaged in September 2008. In August 2009, Hudson gave birth to her first child, a boy named David Daniel Otunga, Jr.

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Mother, brother of singer Jennifer Hudson found murdered, others reported missing
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Arrest made in Jennifer Hudson family killings
In October 2008, Hudson's 57-year-old mother, Darnell Donnerson, and 29-year-old brother, Jason, were found shot dead inside the Chicago home Donnerson shared with Hudson's elder sister, Julia. An AMBER Alert was issued for her 7-year-old nephew, Julian King, when Julia reported him missing. Three days later the Federal Bureau of Investigation confirmed the body found on Chicago's West Side was the nephew, an autopsy indicated the death was due to "multiple gunshot wounds." William Balfour, 27, the estranged husband of Hudson's sister Julia, was charged with three counts of first-degree murder, one count of home invasion and was denied bail. In May 2012 he was convicted on all seven counts against him, including possession of a stolen vehicle. In July 2012, he was sentenced to three life sentences without the possibility of parole; served consecutively, followed by an additional 120 years for his other convictions. He is incarcerated in Stateville Correctional Center near Joliet, Illinois.

Hudson's family announced creation of The Hudson-King Foundation for Families of Slain Victims, in honor of the three victims.