Biography
Leighanne Reena Wallace was born to Shirley "Dee" and Raymond "Ray" Wallace (R.I.P +). She has two older sisters, Suzanne & Tracy, and Two stepsisters and a late stepbrother after Her parents divorced when she was 3, and her mom remarried Jack Tolbet. Since her parents' divorce, Her dad disappeared from her life until
Growing up, Wallace had an eclectic, active background that involved sports. She participated in jazz dance and gymnastics and enjoyed all outdoor activities such as swimming, golf, tennis, and softball until a broken nose injury in seventh grade. When she was a child, she was booked on Star Search. While growing up, she was the manager for the basketball and tennis teams, voted on the Homecoming Court, and participated in Upstage Risk, Marietta's High School Drama Club, which developed her interest in the Arts (They do five to seven productions a year, including two musicals and the contest play. One of these productions is a night of senior-directed one-acts.), a member of the cheerleading squad for basketball and the Powder Puff football team for two years (this is a team which participates in a special game which is held once a year - the girls play football while the boys are the cheerleaders!). She did other extracurricular clubs, including the Flag Corps and Student Council, before graduating from Marietta High School in 1987.
After graduating high school, she did some theater Before coming to Los Angeles to study more and act. However, she was a top model in the Atlanta area, where she donated her time as a local celebrity to various charities, worked in Public Relations for Coca-Cola Corp., taught gymnastics, and nurtured her love for music through writing songs and singing as a pastime. A native of Marietta, Georgia, this Hollywood ingénue combines her beauty with her business savvy and proves that with will and determination, anything is possible.
Wallace started modeling during her sophomore year of high school. She did some print work, a runway, and a training video for Hooters, a restaurant chain. After high school, she has done print ads for Body for Life and skin products (including Danskin Products) and a couple of layouts for an August 1998 issue of Muscle Magazine.
After moving to Los Angeles, California, in the 90s, Leighanne has a face to remember, and she's been popping up all over the Movie scene! Not too long ago, she was on the acclaimed comedy improvisation group, The Groundlings. As her name becomes known, she continues taking classes while auditioning for new projects to move on to bigger and better things for her acting career. On the small screen, she has starred in everything from commercials with Jerry Seinfeld to music videos with the Backstreet Boys to the short-lived series ABC's Jam Bay to NBC's Days Of Our Lives. In 1991, she played the ex-girlfriend in "Here's a Quarter (Call Someone Who Cares)" by Travis Tritt. She played Donna in "As Long As You Love Me," where she met her husband Brian Littrell and appeared in the US version of the Backstreet Boys music video "I'll Never Break Your Heart" as her then-boyfriend's love interest in 1997. Leighanne guest-starred in a Silk Stalkings episode, "Escorting Disaster," as a model named "Devine Farr". Leighanne was living in Los Angeles for only a month when she got the role of college girl "Tanna Stewart" in Wild America with Jonathan Taylor Thomas and has also been seen in such films as My Fellow Americans with Jack Lemmon and James Garner, where she did a sex scene with one of the main characters Carl. She also appeared on Jam Bay, Mortal Combat: Conquest, One Life To Live, and did a Mercedes Benz commercial. Leighanne worked on a new independent film called "Olive Juice," which features cameos by Brian and another Backstreet Boy, A.J. McLean, said to be released in Orlando only. She is the lead character in the movie. She even bought a puppy named Lil' Tyk, which she and Brian had adopted on her audition and landed the job! She recently finished starring in the independent feature "Megalodon," due out July 13, 2004 and is the star of Olive Juice, an independent romantic comedy.
Wallace and her husband appeared on I Heart Nick Carter, along with the other wives and the Backstreet Boys.
She hasn't been in music videos since As Long As You Love Me, and I'll Never Break Your Heart until 2006, Wallace appeared in her husband's music video, Welcome Home (You), with her son, who was 3, in Florida Georgia Line's collaboration video with the Backstreet Boys God, Your Mama and Me in February 2017 No Place with her family on January 4 2019 and her son Baylee's first music video, Don't Knock It later on that same year in July 10, 2019.
On November 30, 2022, with all of the Backstreet Boys families, Wallace, her husband, and their son were in Los Angeles to film the Boys' holiday special "A Very Backstreet Holiday," which was scheduled to air on December 14, 2022.
Leighanne not only starred and co-produced Olive Juice but produced the film's soundtrack with her husband, Backstreet Boy Brian Littrell. This soundtrack was the first project that Brian and Leighanne worked on together, not just as husband and wife but as business partners, as their label and film production company, BriLeigh, came from this collaboration. Leighanne was featured in some Christmas music with husband Brian and son Baylee on two albums: Brian Littrell's Family Christmas on December 6, 2010, and Christmas with the Littrells on December 6, 2011. These albums were just EPs that contained only a few tracks.
While on the set of the Backstreet Boys music video for their single "As Long As You Love Me" in 1997, Leighanne met Brian Littrell, one of the members and CCM singer, when she was showing up for work as one of the girls name Donna. Littrell bump rumps into her, and his heart never lets go. Leighanne didn't know that Brian had spotted her headshot and was anxious to meet her. Neither she nor he was looking for love, and Brian had been out of the dating game for a while, and meeting Leighanne opened a whole new chapter for him. He stated in J-14 magazine about this relationship that he had been out of the dating game for a while, and meeting Leighanne opened a whole new chapter for him. "I had just gotten out of a relationship with a high school sweetheart that didn't work out. I didn't really have my eyes or mind set on anybody. It was something that just happened. If I was looking, I wouldn't have been able to find her." That was how it started. He still refers to their first meeting as 'the day I met the rest of my life.' He then asked her out for Italian food the next day. He dated her for two years ever since, but their relationship grew slowly. As they got to know each other, they spent long evenings talking.
And then, only a few months later, his beloved grandfather died. But meeting Leighanne has been enough to help Brian through his darkest days.
In 1998, the singer fought for his life after he underwent open-heart surgery to correct his heart defect since birth. However, after he twice postponed the life-saving operation to repair the hole in his heart to go on tour with the band, Leighanne gave him an ultimatum: 'If you can't take care of yourself, then you can't take of me, our family, or anything.' Brian admits it was foolish, and Leighanne's decision to walk out on him made him realize how selfish he was.
He proposed to her on Christmas night 1999 after persuading her to join him for an impromptu winter picnic in 32-degree weather at Wallace's mother's house. She admits the rest of the romantic picnic proposal remains in a daze because as soon as she looked into Brian's eyes, she knew exactly what was on his mind. He then shocked her by giving her a stunning four-karat diamond engagement ring with two white diamond trillions flanking in square cut canary-yellow stone, made by Chris Vanoy and Jerry Brickman from Brian's design, and popping the question. It took ten minutes for Wallace to say yes through chattering teeth and for Littrell to slip the ring on her finger, and their engagement, along with the engagement of Kevin Richardson to Kristin Willits, was announced on MTV in February 2000. They married on September 2, 2000, at Peachtree Christian Church in Atlanta, Georgia. Both are committed evangelical Christians. As a recent Rolling Stone Magazine article mentioned, she lives in Atlanta with the famous Backstreet Boy Brian Littrell. On November 26, 2002, Together, they had a son, musician/actor Baylee Thomas Wylee Littrell, who appeared in the Broadway musical Disaster! in 2016 and is now pursuing a similar path as his father's in the entertainment industry. She's working as his manager. Now, as the president of BriLeigh, Leighanne balances her duties as a businesswoman and accessories designer for a now-debunked company she started called "Wylee," actress, mother, and wife.
As of 2023, the family lives in Alpharetta, Georgia, near Atlanta, having been there since 2000, soon after Littrell and his wife got engaged.
On September 11, 2001, Leighanne and the band's crew member, carpenter Daniel Lee, were scheduled to fly from Boston, where the group played their fifth sold-out show the night before, back to Los Angeles aboard American Airlines Flight 11. Littrell canceled her flight the night before to spend more time with her husband, which saved her life, but Lee was one of 92 people killed aboard Flight 11 after it was hijacked and crashed into the North Tower of the World Trade Center in New York City.
On June 26, Wallace lost her mother to a heart condition similar to Brian's.
