American actress Hayden Panettiere, known for her roles in TV shows such as Nashville and Heroes, has died at the age of 36.
“It is with profound sadness that we share the tragic passing of our beloved Hayden. She was an incredible light and a force of nature who brought immeasurable love and joy to all who knew her – and to the millions who watched her on screen,” her father, Skip Panettiere, said in a statement to ABC News on Sunday evening.
He asked for privacy “as our family takes time to process this unimaginable loss”.
Further details surrounding Panettiere's death were not immediately available.
Panettiere was born in New York on August 21, 1989, and began appearing in commercials when she was just 11 months old. Her mother is a former soap opera actress, her father is a firefighter.
Panettiere began her acting career at the age of six in the soap opera One Life to Live, playing Sarah Roberts. She went on to star in another long-running soap, Guiding Light, from 1996 to 2000.
Panettiere also appeared in a string of hit TV shows, including Ally McBeal, Malcolm in the Middle and Law & Order: Special Victims Unit.
But her breakout role came in Heroes, the superhero drama that ran for four seasons from 2006 to 2010. Panettiere played Claire Bennet, a high-school cheerleader with the ability to spontaneously regenerate.
The phrase “Save the cheerleader, save the world” became one of the show's defining catchphrases and helped cement Panettiere as one of its most recognisable stars.
She also appeared in the musical drama Nashville, which ran for four seasons until its cancellation in 2016.
Panettiere also found success on the big screen, appearing in the sports drama Remember the Titans (2000) alongside Denzel Washington, and starring as aspiring figure skater Gen Harwood in Disney's Ice Princess (2005). She went on to lead the teen comedy I Love You, Beth Cooper (2009) and appeared in family film Racing Stripes (2005). One of her best-known film roles came in Scream 4 (2011), in which she played horror-film fanatic Kirby Reed. The character became a fan favourite, and Panettiere returned to the franchise more than a decade later in Scream VI (2023), marking her return to acting after several years away from the screen.
Panettiere dated her Heroes co-star Milo Ventimiglia between 2007 and 2009. She later had an on-and-off relationship with Ukrainian former world heavyweight boxing champion Wladimir Klitschko, and the couple became engaged in 2013. Panettiere gave birth to their daughter, Kaya, in 2014.
In 2015, she spoke about experiencing postpartum depression. "There's a lot of misunderstanding," she said on Live with Kelly and Michael. "There's a lot of people out there who think that it's not real, that it's not true, that it's something that's made up in their minds, that 'oh, it's hormones'. They brush it off. It's something that's completely uncontrollable. It's really painful and it's really scary, and women need a lot of support."
Panettiere also endured personal tragedy in February 2023, when her younger brother, Jansen Panettiere, died unexpectedly at the age of 28. His family later said the cause was cardiomegaly, or an enlarged heart, coupled with complications involving the aortic valve. Jansen was also an actor, and had appeared alongside his sister in the Disney Channel film Tiger Cruise and later The Forger.
In her memoir, This Is Me: A Reckoning, released in May, Panettiere reflected on growing up in the entertainment industry after beginning work as a baby, and the complicated relationship she developed with fame.
“I hope that by reading about the trials and tribulations I've gone through, it can help readers overcome their own obstacles and make sure they know they're not alone, because the worst feeling in the world – especially when you're going through a trying time – is to feel alone,” she told Entertainment Weekly. “All you want to know is that somebody else has gone through and survived what you're going through right now, and even though in the moment it feels like you'll never be OK again. But I also hope people laugh through it as well. I think there's a good balance.”
