Minka Kelly Movies and Career Information

Minka Dumont Kelly (born June 24, 1980) is an American actress. She starred in the NBC series Friday Night Lights as Lyla Garrity from 2006 to 2009. Kelly was born in Los Angeles, California. She is the only child of former Aerosmith guitarist Rick Dufay and Maureen Kelly, an exotic dancer and single mother who often moved with her daughter to different communities before settling in Albuquerque, New Mexico, by the time Minka was in junior high school. She is of Irish and French descent. At 19, after graduating from high school, Kelly returned to Los Angeles. While on a test shoot for a modeling agency, she was approached by a former Playboy Playmate interested in managing her, and who placed Kelly as a receptionist at a surgeon's office who would provide Kelly breast augmentation in exchange for hours worked. She ultimately chose against the procedure, leading to her being fired. However, the exposure to the medical field prompted her to attend school for a year to become a surgeon's assistant; afterward, she worked as a scrub tech. She spent four years in that vocation while also auditioning as an actress before landing the new NBC television drama Friday Night Lights, based on