Katharine McPhee

About Katharine McPhee

Katharine Hope McPhee (born March 25, 1984) is an American pop and R&B singer, songwriter, actress, model, and television personality. She gained fame as a contestant on the fifth season of the Fox reality show American Idol, eventually finishing as the runner-up.

Her self-titled debut album debuted at #2 on the Billboard Top 200, and has sold 378,000 copies to date. The album's lead single, "Over It", went Gold in 2008. She also established an acting career, most notably co-starring in The House Bunny in 2008.

Her sophomore album, Unbroken was released on Verve Forecast Records on October 6, 2009.

Born in Los Angeles, California, McPhee moved with her family to Sherman Oaks at age 12. McPhee has been singing since the age of two. Her mother, Patricia Burch McPhee (stage name Peisha Arten), a vocal coach and accomplished cabaret singer, recognized her daughter's musical talent and decided to train her. Her father, Daniel McPhee, is a television producer. McPhee has an older sister, Adriana. McPhee is of Irish, Scottish and German descent.

McPhee attended Notre Dame High School in Sherman Oaks, where she performed in school plays and musicals. She graduated in 2002.

McPhee attended Boston Conservatory for three semesters, majoring in musical theater. She left the college on the advice of her manager and returned to Los Angeles to try out for television pilots.

McPhee struggled with eating disorders in the past. She told People Magazine that at age 13 she began starving herself and exercising compulsively, and she became bulimic at age 17. McPhee gained weight in college due to her binging. After seven years of illness, she finally entered a three-month rehab program after successfully passing her American Idol audition; her rehab stint ended just before the Idol semifinals started in February 2006. During her run on American Idol, she lost 30 pounds due to eating better as part of her treatment. Now, as she told Teen Vogue in May 2007, "I eat whatever I crave—I'm just really careful about portions."

McPhee and her sister appeared on debut of The Dr. Keith Ablow Show on September 18, 2006, to discuss her struggles with bulimia and her childhood fear of her father. On the show, McPhee stated that she was misdiagnosed with a learning disability during her middle school years but was finally correctly diagnosed with a vision problem that caused her to have trouble reading in class. McPhee claimed she was known as the "pretty, but stupid" girl in school because she had trouble reading.

On February 2, 2008, McPhee married her boyfriend, Nick Cokas, who is nearly 20 years her senior, in a Beverly Hills Presbyterian Church.