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Gina Aponte' is the original Pin Up Foodie, U.S. trademarked on April 5, 2022. She is best known as Hollywood Actress-Host, Trademarked Inventor and Published Author of the first ever Cookbook with Hollywood Pin Up Photography. Her Vintage Hollywood Mini-Cookbook Volume One of "Pin Up Foodie in the Kitchen!" has now released worldwide in digital and print.

Gina Aponte' has been a SAG-AFTRA working Actress since 1996. She was cast in period-piece films like "That Thing You Do" and "Catch Me If You Can"--six months after arriving to LA. She played roles opposite Kiefer Sutherland, Stephen Weber, Willam Hurt, Miranda Richardson--and opposite Jack Wagner and Heather Locklear on Melrose Place. She is an ASCAP Songwriter, and has been since 2002.

In 1996, as a daily working Actress, she worked directly with Tom Hanks in "That Thing You Do." He chose Gina for a featured close-up of her band reaction in their main performance crowd scene. From "extra to featured extra" honor by Tom Hanks, on set, as they shot one scene, for 4 days, 14-16 hour days. In 2002, she worked opposite Leonardo DiCaprio in "Catch Me If You Can," placed in his #1 front corner chair of flight attendants. On one of her 12-hour days of filming Pan Am Flight Attendant scenes, she was picked out of the crowd of extras to shoot a direct one-on-one flight attendant audition feature, for Leonardo DiCaprio's character, there on set that day. She filmed her clip with other hopefuls on the spot, but hers didn't make final cut by Stephen Spielberg. She felt it was still an honor to be selected and later cut by him.

Gina had under-fivers opposite Kiefer Sutherland and Stephen Weber in The Break Up, and opposite William Hurt and Miranda Richardson in The Big Brass Ring. She also played Lead Reporter opposite Heather Locklear on Melrose Place, reporting on the Bobby Parisi case. She was featured as a work-out girl in "Romy and Michelle's High School Reunion," as Morton Downey Jr's Girlfriend on Dick Van Dyke's "Diagnosis Murder," and as a student on the sitcom, "Boston Common."

From 1996-2002, she played multiple roles throughout productions in Hollywood, in short films, student films, and cable films. Most notably, she starred in the production of "Pizza Man," chosen as the finale production of a once-famous Hollywood Jewel Box theater before its closing. From accidentally attending that final stage production, Larry Bishop (Actor/Director/Writer and son of Rat Pack's Joey Bishop) expressed interest in her for two of his upcoming films.

She was featured as a Maxim "Top 100 Hometown Hottie" at Maxim.com and Maxim Inc., and as "Glamour Model" in the Industry's go-to newspaper publishing, "Backstage West" in Los Angeles--in her first 5 years in LA.

She befriended Gabriel Byrne during these years, whom she met in the dog park at her condo, behind the hotel where he was staying at that time, the Sunset-Marquis. Gina had shared with him some pick-up lines she had experienced during her work life in Hollywood. He later shared those lines with David Letterman during his on-air interview. It produced a roar of laughter from his audience, enough where David Letterman rolled back his chair, and spontaneously wrote down Gina's pick-up line onto his famous blue index cards--in jest for his own future use.

As a film star Stand-In, she worked long hours being "lit and blocked" by Hollywood Directors--until asked to step aside off-camera for the talent she stood in for, such as Marcia Gay Harden in "Desperate Measures," Rachel Weiss in "Chain Reaction," and Ashley Judd in "Kiss the Girls."

Quote: "Michael Keaton (the original Batman) on the set of Desperate Measures, was the most brilliant actor I had ever witnessed work--up close and personal. Leonardo DiCaprio was a close second. But in all fairness, my experience was incomparable between the two. I worked for several months with Michael Keaton in the same room. Only days with Leonardo DiCaprio across the room.".

The Writer and Current "Hollywood Cookbook" Author: In 1995, her writing was published for the first time in The Tallahassee Democrat, while attending Florida State University, defending the incoming Sports Illustrated Cover Athlete, FSU Kicker, Scott Bentley. Her Op-Ed Letter ignited great debate at the University over the public bullying that was taking place. She was 21. She was also an avid Seminole Ambassador, one chosen to lead campus tours for incoming Freshman families at Florida State University.

After a BA in English/Language & Literature with Distinction in Creative Writing from Florida State and a post-BA Oxford TESOL-TESL-TEFL, she furthered her English Academia from 1998-2002, spending her evenings at UCLA in multiple Writing Extension Workshops, most notably, Linda Palmer's "Screenplay Development Workshop," which she took multiple times. During those four years, Gina studied with Ivana Chubbuck in classroom studio and privately, mastering her acting technique. She became Ivana's class monitor-assistant in her final years. Gina worked with scene partners like Eva Mendez and Travis Fimmel (Tarzan/Calvin Klein) with classmates like Charlize Theron. Ivana Chubbuck was thanked by Halle Berry and Elisabeth Shue in their Academy Award-winning Oscar speeches, and is known for being private coach to Denzel Washington and Brad Pitt.

On July 5, 2019, her original Vintage Hollywood Pin Up Cookbook Mini-Series Volume One launched on Amazon Worldwide under the title, "Live Like a Pin Up In the Kitchen!" But in 2020, Gina Aponte' stated, "I don't want to tell people how to live--because everyone's circumstances are different. I just want to share what we do, for those people who have asked." She changed the mini-series name to "Pin Up Foodie In the Kitchen." She and her Vintage Hollywood Pin Up Foodie friends of 20+ years are sharing their life-long "comfort-food-made-healthier" recipes straight from their home kitchens. Volume One is straight from Gina Aponte's kitchen, released in February 2024.

In May 2020, Gina Aponte' received her e-Cornell Plant-Based Nutrition and Healthy Living Certification from the T. Colin Campbell Center for Nutrition Studies, Ithaca, New York. She continues to further her passion for Plant-Based Nutrition and Healthy Living, excited to share that information on TV in 2024 with her Vintage Hollywood Pin Up Foodie girlfriends, under the title "Pin Ups and Foodies."

"Pin Ups and Foodies" Television show is in Network pitch phase under Ken Lindner & Associates, with "Pin Up Foodie" Trademark representation under Alesha Dominique @ Norton Rose Fulbright.

Actress Gina Aponte' on the Red Carpet @ SAG Awards, Los Angeles

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