James Maslow
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Biography
James David Maslow (born July 16, 1990) is an American actor and singer.He played the role of James Diamond on Nickelodeon's Big Time Rush and is a former member of the boy band with the same name. He also starred as Kevin Mohr on the Sony Crackle original series Sequestered. In 2014, Maslow competed as a contestant on the eighteenth season of Dancing with the Stars, in which he reached fourth place. In 2018, Maslow was cast as one of the celebrity houseguests on the first American edition of Celebrity Big Brother where Maslow finished in 6th place.
Early life
Maslow was born in New York City, New York and raised in La Jolla, California. His father is Jewish and his mother is Catholic; he was raised Jewish. He attended Hebrew school six days a week during his childhood, and celebrated his Bar Mitzvah. He has described himself as a "religious and spiritual person".
At the age of six, Maslow began training as a singer when his parents placed him in the San Diego Children's Choir. He attended La Jolla and Torrey Pines elementary schools, Muirlands Middle School, and San Diego School of Creative and Performing Arts. He had a small role in the San Diego Opera's production of La bohème when he was 10 years old. He attended acting camp at the La Jolla Playhouse, got his first agent when he was 14, and performed as Marius in a production of Les Misérables. Quitting the San Diego School of Creative and Performing Arts (SDSCPA) midway through the 10th grade, Maslow switched to Coronado School of the Arts (CoSA). He graduated from CoSA in 2007 in the musical theater department.
Career
2008–2014: Big Time Rush
Maslow made his acting debut in 2008 as Shane in an episode of the Nickelodeon show iCarly. He also appeared in urFRENZ in 2009, in which he portrayed a character named Brandon. In 2012, he filmed an episode of See Dad Run, playing the role of actor Scott Baio's former TV son, Ricky. In 2007 Maslow sent his audition tape for a new Nickelodeon sitcom and received the role of James Diamond two years later in the show Big Time Rush, along with Kendall Schmidt, Carlos Pena, Jr., and Logan Henderson. They also formed the real boyband Big Time Rush. An album of original songs from the first season plus some others was released October 11, 2010, entitled B.T.R. It sold 67,000 copies in its first week and was certified Gold by the RIAA five months later in March 2011. On November 21, 2011, the band released their second album called "Elevate" which sold over 70,000 copies on its first week. Maslow and his bandmates co-wrote 8 out of the 12 songs. Maslow wrote "Elevate", co-wrote "Love Me Love Me" and the first single from the album, "Music Sounds Better With U". The UK version of the album included a bonus song called "Epic" which he also helped write.
Maslow and Big Time Rush have a third album called 24/Seven which was released on June 11, 2013. The band promoted the album with the tour shared with Victoria Justice called the Summer Break Tour. which began on June 21 and ended on August 15. On late Winter 2014, Maslow and the band went to their latest tour called "Big Time Rush Live 2014 World Tour", where they performed in Texas and 7 countries in Latin America.
2014–present: Solo career
On March 4, 2014, ABC announced that Maslow would take part in the 18th season of Dancing with the Stars. He was paired with professional dancer Peta Murgatroyd. Ultimately, Maslow made it to the finals, but was eliminated on the first night. Maslow finished in fourth place, with an average score of 26.9 (excluding scores from guest judges). In a vote on Twitter, Maslow was nevertheless chosen "in a landslide" to perform an encore of his freestyle dance during the season finale. During his time on the show, Maslow earned the first perfect score of the season for his contemporary dance to "Let It Go" from Frozen on Disney Night. He featured on the cover of the July 2014 issue of FitnessRx Magazine.
| Dancing with the Stars performances and results | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Week # | Dance/song | Judges' score | Result | |||
| Inaba | Goodman | Guest | Tonioli | |||
| 1 | Foxtrot / "Story of My Life" | 7 | 7 | — | 7 | No Elimination |
| 2 | Salsa / "Follow the Leader" | 9 | 8 | — | 8 | Safe |
| 3 | Jive / "The Middle" | 9 | 9 | 9 | 9 | Safe |
| 4 | Tango / "Dark Horse" | 9 | 8 | 9 | 9 | No Elimination |
| 5 | Contemporary / "Let It Go" | 10 | 10 | 10 | 10 | Safe |
| 6 | Quickstep / "You're the One That I Want" | 9 | 8 | 9 | 9 | Safe |
| 7 | Samba / "Gasolina" Team Freestyle / "The Cup of Life" | 9 8 | 8 8 | 9 10 | 9 9 | Last to be called safe |
| 8 | Viennese Waltz / "6'2" Celebrity Dance Duel (Jive) / "Ain't Nothing Wrong with That" | 8 9 | 9 10 | 10 10 | 9 10 | Last to be called safe |
| 9 | Cha-cha-cha / "Love Never Felt So Good" Rumba / "Islands in the Stream" | 10 9 | 10 9 | 10 9 | 10 9 | Safe |
| 10 | Tango / "Adore You" Freestyle / "Original Don" | 9 10 | 10 9 | — | 10 10 | Eliminated |
Also in 2014 Maslow was cast in the 2015 Lifetime television movie Seeds of Yesterday in the leading role of Bart Foxworth. He released his first single "Lies" on July 24, 2015. He has also released another single called "Circles" on October 23, 2015. In addition, he has two covers, "Cheerleader" and "One Call Away" available for purchase on iTunes. In 2017 James debuted his solo album titled, How I Like It from which he has highlighted the single by the same name.Towards the end of 2017, James collaborated with director Joshua Schultz for his music video for the song "Who Knows," off his "How I Like It" debut album. In 2018 James competed in the first American season of Celebrity Big Brother where he was evicted on day 24.
In 2018 Maslow released new singles "Falling" and "All Day".
Most recently, on April 26, 2019, Maslow released "Love U Sober", and announced that he is about to start releasing more singles.
In May 2019, it was announced that Maslow would be starring in independent film We Need to Talk, co-starring Emily Bett Rickards, and written and directed by Todd Wolfe.
Discography
Studio albums
| Title | Album details |
|---|---|
| How I Like It |
|
Singles
As lead artist
| Title | Year | Album |
|---|---|---|
| "Lies" (featuring Unlike Pluto) | 2015 | Non-album single |
| "Circles" | ||
| "Cry" (featuring City Fidelia) | 2017 | How I Like It |
| "How I Like It" | ||
| "Who Knows" | ||
| "Christmas Beautiful" | Non-album single | |
| "Falling" | 2018 | |
| "All Day" (featuring Dominique) | ||
| "Love U Sober" | 2019 | |
| "Delirious" | ||
| "Did You Forget" |
As featured artist
| Title | Year | Album |
|---|---|---|
| "Never Too Young" (MattyB featuring James Maslow) | 2013 | Non-album single |
| "Now The Time Has Come" | 2017 |
Other appearances
| Title | Year | Other artist(s) | Album |
|---|---|---|---|
| "Mirrors" | 2013 | Cimorelli | Best Of 2013 |
Tours
- How I Like It Tour (2017)
Awards and nominations
Maslow received a nomination in 2014 at the annual Young Hollywood Awards for hottest body which he lost to former Dancing With The Stars competitor Derek Hough. In the same year, Maslow again received recognition for his charitable efforts with the annual VH1 Do Something! "Celebs Gone Good Awards", though he failed to make the winners list as Taylor Swift had won that time for the third consecutive Year. In addition to these nominations, James Maslow was nominated as Favorite International TV Star at the Australian Kids Choice Awards between 2010 and also again in 2011. He has also been recognized with an Australian Astra Award nomination for Favorite International Actor or Personality at the 2011 event, but did not win. In 2014, Maslow along with cast and crew of the Sony Crackle drama series Sequestered received 2(IAWTVA) International Academy of Web Television Awards for Best Drama Series and one for Best Ensemble Cast losing both bids. As a musician, in July 2017, Maslow was declared the winner of Macy's iHeartRadio Rising Star competition and opened the iHeartRadio Music Festival.
