Summary
- Emily and Zooey Deschanel are Hollywood's quirkiest celebrity siblings and have become more famous than their showbiz parents.
- Emily is a philanthropist and animal rights activist, while Zooey is a singer, musician, and founder of the feminist website, HelloGiggles.
- The Deschanel sisters have had interesting personal experiences that have influenced their acting careers, such as Zooey being mistaken for a criminal and Emily being sued over a leased horse.
Emily and Zooey Deschanel just might be Hollywood’s quirkiest celebrity siblings. The celebrity sisters were born and raised in L.A. by showbiz parents Caleb (the cinematographer for Passion of the Christ) and Mary Jo (Eileen Hayward on Twin Peaks). They named their youngest daughter after one of the protagonists of the J.D. Salinger novella Franny and Zooey (via Slate). However, the sisters are known for starring in their own massively popular Fox TV shows and have become more famous than their parents. Emily spent 12 seasons as the eccentric forensic anthropologist who solved murders on the procedural drama Bones, while Zooey portrayed a breezier eccentric on the sitcom New Girl.
When the Deschanel sisters aren’t charming television audiences, they follow their passions. Emily is a philanthropist and a staunch animal rights activist. Zooey is a singer and musician performing as the “She” of She & Him, and with the jazz cabaret act, If All the Stars Were Pretty Babies. She also founded the feminist website, HelloGiggles. However, those are just their resumes, and the personal lives of Emily and Zooey Deschanel are just as fascinating. While their careers progress, it's intriguing to look back on their history together and see some of their real-life experiences, which have informed many of their acting choices.
Zooey Deschanel Was Sued For Injuring A Horse
According to The Independent, in 2014, Patty Parker filed a suit claiming that after leasing her horse to Zooey Deschanel for $13,000, the horse was, "a shell of [his] former self… injured and unusable." Deschanel denies that she is responsible for Literati’s issues and insists that she "fully complied with each and every provision set forth in the lease.” Furthermore, Zooey claims she returned the horse in good condition. A veterinarian testified on Deschanel’s behalf, saying it’s impossible to know what really caused Literati’s suspensory ligament injury. Literati even satisfactorily performed in a competition after the termination of Deschanel’s lease.
Acting Wasn't Emily Deschanel's First Career Choice
Emily and Zooey Deschanel are enchanting actors, and Emily is great in the procedural crime series Bones, she didn’t always want to become an actor. Deschanel told BuddyTV, "I think [Zooey and I] both loved doing plays since we were really young. But I didn't think of it as doing it as a profession." Instead, the actor wanted to become an architect. Having observed her parents in show business, she didn’t hold any illusions about what it entailed, adding “I think a lot of times people go into the profession and think that it is about glamor…that it's easy... I think we never thought any of those things."
Emily Deschanel Bullied Zooey Growing Up
Emily and Zooey Deschanel were typical siblings growing up. Emily Deschanel exhibited acting talent at a young age when she convinced her little sister that “Neptunians had [taken] my real sister and replaced her with a facsimile who looked just like her, talked just like her, but when my parents weren't in the room, made crazy faces at me.” Emily confessed on Conan (via Nicki Swift), elaborating that it went beyond pulling weird faces. "I would tell her… that I'd [hurt] her sister and taken over her body, and that I was going to kill her next." Zooey recalled, "she would make me cry and then she would laugh."
Zooey Deschanel Was Mistaken For A Criminal
With the power of closed-captioning comes the responsibility to get the names of suspected terrorists right. Typos can sometimes have serious consequences, such as when Dallas-Fort Worth’s Fox affiliate KDFW misidentified the Boston Marathon bomber as "19-year-old Zooey Deschanel" (via People). Producer Peter Ogburn caught the error and tweeted a photo of his TV screen commenting, "Oh come on, Fox!" By the time Deschanel caught wind of it from Joel McHale’s feed, Ogburn’s post had been re-tweeted over 4,000 times. Deschanel good-naturedly wrote, "Whoa! Epic closed captioning FAIL!" Caption Solutions immediately apologized, saying that the responsible party deeply regretted the mistake.
Zooey Deschanel Lives With ADHD
Some of Zooey Deschanel’s energetic personality might stem from Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder. In a (now deleted) 2011 post on her HelloGiggles blog, Zooey confessed that though she loves crafts, her ADHD prevents her from completing anything too complex (via Cosmopolitan). In "Crafternoon with Zooey D," she wrote, "Are you an un-medicated adult with Attention Deficit Disorder who also LOVES to do crafts? I AM! I barely have the patience to write this opening paragraph (I have already gotten up four times), so I need to focus my unfocused mind on projects that can be completed very quickly."
Emily Deschanel Almost Wasn't Cast In Bones
While Producers never named the actress who was the favorite for the role of Bones' brilliant but socially inept forensic anthropologist, Temperance Brennan, Emily Deschanel wasn't the Bones character frontrunner. Apparently, Deschanel can thank David Boreanaz for her career-defining role (via IGN). Once producers had decided on Boreanaz for Seeley Booth, they had him read with prospective actresses and they couldn’t deny the chemistry he had with Deschanel. After their first interaction, Boreanaz exclaimed, "This chick's got moxie!" Emily impressed show creator Hart Hanson when, as Brennan, she didn’t physically back down from Booth during a confrontation scene.
Zooey Deschanel Accused Her Manager Of Career Sabotage
In the late 2010s, Zooey Deschanel was engaged in a complex and bitter lawsuit with her former managers (via THR). Initially, Sarah Jackson of Seven Summits Pictures & Management sued Deschanel over unpaid commissions from her HelloGiggles website. Deschanel countersued claiming that she lost income when Jackson encouraged her to switch agencies from CAA to UTA. Deschanel’s lawyers put forth that Seven Summits "outrageously breached its fiduciary obligation to put [Zooey’s] interests first." Deschanel maintains that as a result, she lost lucrative roles during the 2013 New Girl shooting hiatus. Jackson’s defense argues that Deschanel was too busy touring with her band She & Him to accept acting work.
Emily Deschanel's Pregnancy Positively Affected Bones' Production
When Emily Deschanel learned she was having her first baby, Deschanel's pregnancy was written into Bones. Executive producer Stephan Nathan claims they’d already discussed a baby as a way to resolve the romantic tension between Brennan and Booth. Emily’s pregnancy fast-tracked the relationship between the leads. It worked so well that it was a non-issue when Deschanel became pregnant a second time. According to Metro, at first, Deschanel was skeptical. "I was worried I was going to ruin the show with my own pregnancy – but the writers said they didn’t want to ignore it, so they wrote it in. Now I think it has worked in our favor.”
Zooey Deschanel Made Her Own Clothes When She Was A Teenager
When Deschanel was young, her mother caught her attempting to wrap some thread around a straight pin and decided to teach her daughter how to sew properly. Deschanel’s skills came in handy in high school when her meager allowance couldn’t support the aspiring actor's growing need for theatrical clothing. In 2014, Zooey teamed up with designer Tommy Hilfiger to create a line of dresses that reflected her signature style. While promoting the line, according to The LA Times, she told the press, "I made a dress with box pleats that had a hidden pleat detail like this when I was a kid. It was my crowning achievement."
Zooey & Emily Deschanel Have Totally Opposite Diets
Not only is Emily Deschanel a regular contributor to numerous animal welfare non-profits but she's also a vegan. However, Emily and Zooey Deschanel have diets that couldn't be more different. As an adult, Zooey Deschanel had contracted a serious gluten allergy known as Coeliac, as well as dairy and egg intolerance. Zooey told Vulture that she thought adopting her sister’s diet was the solution. "I was like, 'It'll be easy! I can't have that stuff anyway.' But I didn't realize you have so few options in the end. To be a gluten-free vegan is, like, the most difficult thing you can possibly be. And I lasted, like, six months."
Zooey Deschanel Was Unhappy Growing Up In Los Angeles
Because the Deschanels are a showbiz family, both Zooey and Emily Deschanel got to observe the inner workings of Hollywood at a young age. Emily saw this as an advantage, saying she "appreciated what Los Angeles has to offer." Nature wins over nurture with Zooey, who felt that her peers were too superficial. Zooey commented, "Well you're never gonna be the prettiest girl in the room, so just don't even try…" The actor also noted a disturbing disparity between the genders, adding, "At my high school [Crossroads] there were just way more pretty girls than there were guys to go out with them."
Emily Deschanel Sued 20th Century Fox
In 2015, Emily Deschanel, Bones co-star David Boreanaz, joined a Bones lawsuit filed by executive producer Kathy Reichs, claiming that 20th Century Fox owed them "tens of millions of dollars" in profits. The case argues that they had yet to receive the money they were due. Deschanel and Boreanaz say their contracts entitled them to 3 percent of profits. Allegedly, they have evidence of "more than a dozen accounting errors, tricks, and deceitful acts that 20th TV has used to deprive plaintiffs of their entitlement to profits." Fox asked to move the suit to arbitration. Deschanel, Boreanaz, and Reichs won $179 million in damages (via THR).
Zooey Deschanel Was Bullied & Body-Shamed
Zooey Deschanel didn’t just hate the superficial vibe of L.A., but she often found herself the subject of ridicule as children in middle school picked on her for being "chubby" (via Allure). Deschanel explained, "Girls spit in my face... People were so mean to me. I'd cry every day." It didn’t help that Zooey was forced to leave her friends for weeks at a time when her father traveled for work. Deschanel added, "[I] hated all the traveling … I’m really happy now that I had the experience, but at the time I was just so miserable to have to leave my friends in Los Angeles and go to places where they didn’t have any food I liked or things I was used to."
Zooey Deschanel Is A College Drop-Out
As part of her very Hollywood childhood, Zooey Deschanel went to Crossroads, a “nontraditional” school with a “program built on a progressive, developmental model of education.” Her peers included Jake Gyllenhaal and Kate Hudson. When it came time to pick a college, Deschanel went to the most normal place she could think of. The actor explained (via Today), "I was like, 'It'd be cool to have a traditional college experience.'" However, after a year at Northwestern, conventional college wasn’t working out. Deschanel added, "I was like, 'Oh, but none of these people understand what's cool about me. My specialness is not appreciated in this place.'"
Zooey Deschanel Has An American Girl Obsession
Some have called Zooey Deschanel’s quirkiness an affectation. But there aren’t many grown women who would confess to obsessing over the historically-themed American Girl dolls. On Conan, Zooey gushed about the popular toy line with the host (via Glamour), whose own daughter adores her Kit Kitteridge doll. Zooey recalled that in her youth, she would conceive dramatic storylines for her two dolls. Samantha Parkington, the pink-frocked Victorian brunette, was "rich, and her friend was poor." The "poor" friend was Molly, the bespectacled WWII-era girl. She told Conan that she’d recently thrown a party at an American Girl Place, which included makeovers with the dolls.
Emily Deschanel Is Desensitized To Violence
Emily and Zooey Deschanel had totally different roles on TV, and as a result, Emily is frequently asked if she ever got squeamish when handling the gruesome prop corpses. Emily admitted that it was upsetting at first, but after years of playing a clinically-minded forensic anthropologist, the macabre of it all began to feel commonplace (via TV Tango). The actor explained, "The things that affected me most were in earlier series. I have definitely become desensitized, which I don’t think is necessarily a good thing." Deschanel even went to a coroner's office to research for the role, which she confessed was way more disturbing than anything in the fictional show.
Zooey Deschanel Inspired A Break-Up Album
Before Zooey Deschanel married producer Jacob Pechenik and had children, she was married to musician Ben Gibbard. Death Cab For Cutie's eighth album, Kintsugi features several songs about Gibbard’s 2012 divorce from Zooey. According to The Sydney Morning Herald, though Gibbard veiled the references, he knew that the subject matter was transparent, noting, "Everybody knows the story of my personal life, to some extent, over the last four or five years, so I didn't feel it was necessary to go into detail about all that stuff." He briefly contemplated not going there at all, but soon realized that writing music was essential to his grieving process.
Zooey Deschanel Won Her New Girl Role Over Amanda Bynes
While Zooey Deschanel is iconic as Jess in New Girl, it almost looked much different, as she was up against Amanda Bynes for the lead role in the sitcom (via The Things). The former Nickelodeon prodigy was working on a comeback after having announced her retirement on Twitter (via EW). When the producers of New Girl passed on Bynes for the lead in favor of Zooey Deschanel, it may have been a turning point for both actresses. After Easy A, Bynes dealt with personal issues more than acting while Deschanel went on to become a huge TV star and the popular sitcom ran for 7 seasons.
Zooey Deschanel Doesn't Like Being Called "Adorkable"
New Girl's tagline is "Simply Adorkable," and though known for her effortless idiosyncrasy, Zooey Deschanel hates the term "adorkable" and the stigma it carries. The actor said the word was used in a calculated marketing scheme to promote New Girl, and that she doesn't associate with the characters she plays all that much (via HuffPost). Deschanel explained, "I don’t always identify, perhaps, with the way that I’m portrayed in certain public contexts. I try to stay away from that sort of thing." However, being considered “adorkable” has its advantages, as Deschanel earned $125,000 per episode of New Girl, as well as Emmy and Golden Globe nominations.
Zooey & Emily Deschanel Are Totally Different
Emily and Zooey Deschanel share parents and careers, but Zooey and Emily are two very different people. In addition to their diets and extra-curricular activities, the sisters have very distinctive fashion styles. Fans know Zooey for her colorful retro-inspired dresses, while Emily prefers a more muted, modern style. In 2013, Emily spoke to Metro about other differences between the Deschanel siblings. "There are similarities from having grown up in the same household. We have lots of things in common but view the world in different ways. The way we think is completely different and we have different ways of going about things.”