She really doesn’t do much but show up, but for Nicole
Richie that has been enough to make her one the most recognizable names in Hollywood. She was born Nicole Camilla Escovedo on September 21, 1981 to the drummer
Peter Escovedo, but when she was nine years old, Nicole was adopted by
Ecovedo’s band member, Lionel Richie. Unlike many stars who lay claim to
having had an early ambition of stardom and riches, Nicole’s fortunate
opportunity to annex the Richie name allowed her to fall into the good life
without much thought at all.
While in school at the ultra-exclusive Buckley School in Los Angeles Richie met Paris Hilton. After graduation Nicole attended the University of Arizona, but after two years she dropped out and moved back to California. Upon
her return Richie met up with her old friend Paris. In 2003, after Paris’ sister Nicky Hilton turned the offer down, Fox asked Richie to appear with Paris in a reality TV show. She agreed, and in the fall of that year “The Simple Life”
took off. The show played off the painfully obvious fact that the two girls,
one an heiresses and the other just ridiculously rich, had never worked a day
in their lives. What might have seemed to be a recipe for disaster turned into
one of the year’s most irresistible guilty pleasures.
“The Simple Life” aired for two more seasons. Then, after
“The Simple Life: Interns,” the two best friends had a falling out that neither
of them will discuss publicly. No one outside the two girls’ immediate circles
of friends knows exactly what happened, but their once unbreakable bond of
friendship forged in the diamond encrusted cauldrons of wealth and prestige is
perhaps over.
Although Richie is set to inherit an estimated $200 million
dollars, she has not had an easy go at life. In 2003 she was convicted of
possession of heroin and had to attend drug rehab. She says that, although as
a child she was never in want of anything material, she was a little girl who much
of the time was alone and hungered for attention. After her breakup with Paris
she has had not only to battle rumors of concealing an eating disorder, but this
past December she suffered yet another split, this time with her fiancé Adam
Goldstein a.k.a D.J. AM.
Nicole Richie is an easy target for those looking to poke
fun at the rich and clueless, but she has done her best to break past the
stereotype of someone who lavishes in unearned fame. She has written a
semi-autobiographical novel titled The Truth About Diamonds, and in the
near future, she hopes to tap into her musical roots and release an album.