Elisabetta Canalis (Italian: [elizaˈbɛtta kaˈnaːlis]; born 12 September 1978) is an Italian actress and television personality.
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Early life
Elisabetta Canalis was born in Sassari, Sardinia, in Italy. Her father, Cesare, is a clinical radiologist at the University of Sassari, and her mother, Bruna, was a teacher. She has a brother named Luigi, also a radiologist, who was involved in a Switzerland debt scandal.
Canalis was educated at Sassari's "classical" high school (liceo classico). She went on to study foreign languages at the University of Milan, but she quit her course without graduating at the age of twenty-one in order to work as a dancer for Silvio Berlusconi's TV channel Canale 5.
Career
Acting and presenting
Elisabetta Canalis was a dancer on the Canale 5 TV show Striscia la notizia from 1999 to 2002. Canalis had minor roles in the films Deuce Bigalow: European Gigolo and Virgin Territory, a comedy produced by Roberto Cavalli. In 2005, she replaced a busy Michelle Hunziker in Love Bugs 2, the second season of the sitcom Love Bugs. In 2007, she co-hosted the annual Italian music festival, Festivalbar but the TV program closed. In 2009, she replaced a pregnant Elena Santarelli on the Italian version of Total Request Live, on MTV Italia. Elisabetta hosted the Trofeo Birra Moretti 2008, a summer football competition played between S.S.C. Napoli, A.C. Milan and Juventus.
