Brooks Nader took a leap of faith into Hollywood and never looked back.
Nader, 28, was born in Baton Rouge and raised in an “extremely Christian and extremely conservative” household with her mother, father and three younger sisters.
The “Love Thy Nader” star always fantasized about pursuing her big-city dreams but told Maxim magazine her parents were “totally against” the idea.
“For the majority of our childhood, my dad was working for a non-profit, and my mom was at home with the babies,” Nader recalled. “We didn’t have a lot of money. We really just had each other and had to be self-entertaining. I wouldn’t trade that upbringing for the world.”
Despite her close-knit upbringing, Nader was obsessed with Hollywood and had a penchant for fashion.
“I always wanted to express myself and I wanted to look sexy,” she said. “I fantasized about living in LA or New York, but it seemed worlds away. I also had to toe the line because of where I’m from.”
When Nader, who idolized the likes of Cindy Crawford, Pamela Anderson and Christie Brinkley, was offered an opportunity to connect with a modeling scout, the 18-year-old college student set her sights on the Big Apple.
BROOKS NADER HEATS UP SAINT-TROPEZ WITH LEOPARD-PRINT SWIMSUIT, SHEER DRESS
“I called my parents and said, ‘I’m moving to the Hamptons for the summer,” Nader remembered. “They were totally against it, but I moved and got a finance internship all on my own.”
She also managed to connect with an agent and decided it was time to drop out of school, much to her parents’ dismay.
“They said, ‘This is the dumbest thing you could ever do,’” Nader recalled.
The “Dancing with the Stars” contestant remembered her first few jobs in the industry traveling on graveyard shift-hour trains for low-paying gigs modeling lingerie.
“I’m thankful and grateful for those jobs to this day; they kept me afloat,” Nader said. “You can’t wait for other people. It’s all up to you. You have to put in the work, go do it and see the vision for yourself.”
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She dreamed of being on the pages of the “Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue” and begged her agency to help her with placement to little avail. Her representatives didn’t believe Nader had “the status” to be in the famous magazine, so she took matters into her own hands and went to an open-call audition in Miami.
After a grueling eight-hour wait with 10,000 other hopefuls, Nader was one of six girls who passed the test and made it into the issue. Fans then voted her to win the Rookie of the Year title.
“Then, five years later, I made it onto the cover,” she said. “I think people really started to take me seriously then. And, yes, I did send a signed copy over to my former agents, too.”
Family comes first for Nader, who said that “being a good role model is everything to me” when it came to paving the way for her three sisters.
“It’s a blessing that we get to work together, play together and create together,” she said.
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Her relationship with “DWTS” partner Gleb Savchenko made headlines earlier this year, but Nader admitted she’s content being single.
“To impress me, it’s all about personality,” she said. “I did the whole pretty boy thing. I just want you to make me laugh. And someone who is a great listener, respectful, caring, chilled out, someone who supports my dreams – and is cool with my chaos.”
“I feel like I’m always making the plans, so I find it sexy when someone takes control and plans a date, whether you’re picking me up in a car or helicopter.”
Prior to her on-off romance with Savchenko, Nader weathered the divorce storm with ex Billy Haire. The former couple met in 2015 and married four years later. She announced their divorce in 2024 after five years of marriage.
“When I was younger, all I knew was that I should get married, have a husband and be a good wife,” she said. “That’s what was in our brains from a young age. I thought that was what women were supposed to do. That’s probably why I ended up getting married at such a young age.”
Today, Nader’s focused on her career, which was too big of a dream to conceive when she was growing up in Louisiana.
“I’d love to play a version of myself in a movie,” she said. “A crazy Southern girl who is living in the wild world of New York. Kind of like how Eva Longoria is pretty much herself in ‘Desperate Housewives,’ She always said she didn’t even have to act.”
