Cindy Lou Who From 'Dr. Seuss' How the Grinch Stole Christmas' Is All Grown Up Now
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You might remember Cindy Lou Who from 2000's Dr. Seuss' How the Grinch Stole Christmas as the sweet little girl from Whoville who just wanted to believe that everyone had at least a tiny bit of good in them, including the mean old Grinch. But where's the adorable blue-eyed little girl who played her today?
Well, you might be in for a bit of a shock. Actress Taylor Momsen, now 28, has swapped the cutesy outfits and crazy up-dos for a more, erm, tough look.
Taylor was just seven years old when she played Cindy Lou, but she went on to act in other projects as she got older, including Spy Kids 2: The Island of Lost Dreams and, most memorably, playing Jenny Humphrey in the hit TV series Gossip Girl.
But according to Entertainment Weekly, the Missouri native decided to ditch her acting career at the age of 18 to focus on music, fronting a rock band called The Pretty Reckless. These days, she is frequently seen sporting heavy black eye makeup and disheveled hair, a look that completes her new punk rock persona.
Given her interest in music, it's perhaps no surprise to learn that Taylor's favorite memory of her Dr. Seuss' How the Grinch Stole Christmas experience was recording the movie's theme song.
"I'll never forget walking into this beautiful [recording] studio, with this immaculate console in front of me, and putting headphones on and singing into a microphone for the first time, singing 'Where Are You Christmas'," she told TODAY in 2020. "That was such an impactful moment in my life because it made me go, 'I wanna make music for the rest of my life. I love being in a recording studio.'"
All in all, it seems Taylor's music career is a success. Several of The Pretty Reckless's songs have landed at number one on the rock charts, even surpassing tunes by the likes of Stevie Nicks and the Pretenders. When EW asked Momsen if she missed acting, she replied saying, "No, not at all… I think when I quit acting, everyone thought I was crazy, and now it's three number ones later, so they were wrong."
The Pretty Reckless has released three albums to date, including 2021's Death by Rock and Roll, which rose to the top of the charts. "In a lot of ways this album really feels like a rebirth for the band," Taylor told TODAY. "We went through a lot of loss and a lot of tragedy in the past couple of years, and this album is really a culmination of all of that." The band currently has several live shows scheduled for 2022, their first live performances in almost four years.
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