Julianne Alexandra Hough (/hʌf/; born July 20, 1988) is an American dancer, actress and singer. She is a two-time professional champion of ABC\'s Dancing with the Stars. She was nominated for a Creative Arts Primetime Emmy in 2007 for Outstanding Choreography in season five of the show. Her first leading acting role was in the 2011 film remake of Footloose. In September 2014, Hough joined Dancing with the Stars as a permanent fourth judge. Along with her brother Derek Hough (who is a six-time winner of the dancing show) and Tessandra Chavez, she won the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Choreography in 2015. In 2016, she played Sandy in the live Fox television production of Grease.\n', '

Hough was born in Orem, Utah, the youngest of five children in a Latter-day Saints (Mormon) family. Her parents are Marianne and Bruce Hough; her father was twice chairman of the Utah Republican Party. Her brother, Derek Hough, is also a professional dancer. She also has three older sisters: Sharee, Marabeth and Katherine. All four of Hough\'s grandparents were dancers. She is also a second cousin of musicians Riker, Rydel, Rocky and Ross Lynch from R5, their maternal grandmothers being sisters.\n', '

Hough\'s formal training began at the Center Stage Performing Arts Studio in Orem, where she danced with Josh Murillo, among others, in Latin Ballroom; she began dancing competitively at nine. In 1999, when she was 10, her divorcing parents sent her and brother Derek to London to live and study with their coaches, Corky and Shirley Ballas. The Ballases helped tutor the two Hough children alongside their own son, Mark. Following in Derek\'s footsteps, she joined him at the Italia Conti Academy of Theatre Arts when a slot opened up at that school. They received training in song, theatre, gymnastics and many forms of dance, including jazz, ballet, and tap. The three children formed their own pop music trio 2B1G ("2 Boys, 1 Girl") when Hough was 12, performed at dance competitions in the UK and the U.S., and showcased in a UK television show. At 15, Julianne Hough became the youngest dancer, and only American, to win both Junior World Latin Champion and International Latin Youth Champion at the Blackpool Dance Festival. She left London that year, after having been "abused, mentally, physically, everything," she said, a situation that escalated "when I started hitting puberty, when I started becoming a woman and stopped being a little girl. ... I was told if I ever went back to the United States, three things were going to happen. One: I was going to amount to nothing. Two: I was going to work at Whataburger. And three: I was going to end up a slut. So, it was like, I can\'t go back. I have to be this person." After returning to the U.S., she attended the Las Vegas Academy and Alta High School.\n', '

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