A.J. Cook Net Worth And Biography

Andrea Joy Cook professionally known as A.J. Cook is a Canadian actress who is best known for her role as Special Agent Jennifer Jareau on the CBS crime drama, Criminal Minds (2005-2020). RNN details A.J. Cook’s net worth, biography, and career in this article.

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Bio-Data

Biography

A.J. Cook was born on July 22, 1978, in Oshawa, Ontario. She lived most of her early life in nearby Whitby where she attended Anderson Collegiate Vocational Institute. A.J. Cook has three siblings, Nathan, Paul, and Angela. When she was in the second grade, she was declared legally blind due to severe astigmatism. She wore contacts and thick glasses to help correct her vision. In 2007, she underwent a lens implant surgery that helped correct the impairment.

While making a recount of her childhood experience, A.J. Cook reported that she “truly couldn’t see” and that “everything appeared like a smear of colour with no outlines” when she was a toddler, and those other children were “mean.” She added that at the time of her diagnosis, she was struggling academically and that initially, people assumed she had a learning disability because she couldn’t read, but in reality, the problem was that she couldn’t see the board, which made it difficult for her to recognise the letters and understand the sounds they made.

A.J. Wood started dancing when she was four and began taking jazz, tap and ballet classes. She confessed that dance kept her engaged while she was growing and she considers it as such because she didn’t have to recite or read anything. For many years, she danced in competitions before she finally decided to try acting out at the age of 16. She loved to dance so much that she confirmed that if hadn’t taken up acting, she would have probably set up a dance studio somewhere. In an interview, she confessed she still does tap dances.

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Early Career

In 1997, A.J. Cook’s had her first job in McDonald’s commercial. Afterwards, she moved to working on series, which was launched with a guest role she had in the Goosebumps series, and parts in two TV movies, In His Father’s Shoes and Elvis Meets Nixon. A.J. Cook kick-started her feature film career as one of five suicidal Lisbon sisters in The Virgin Suicides (199). In the same year, she had a starring role in the Higher Ground series where she played Shelby Merrick. The film lasted just one season and it ended with a romance between A.J. Cook’s character and Scott played by Hayden Christensen.

Following Higher Ground, A.J. Cook starred in The Spiral Staircase movie and then captured leading roles in several movies, including Out Cold, I’m Reed Fish, Ripper and Final Destination 2. In 2003, she appeared in Dead Like Me and season one of Tru Calling as Lindsay Walker.

Later Career

In September 2005, she starred as Jennifer Jareau, “JJ” in Criminal Minds. On June 14, 2010, an announcement was made, stating that A.J. Cook’s contract option would not be picked up for season six as a series regular reportedly because of budget cuts. However, she returned for two episodes to conclude her character’s storyline following several letters and petitions sent over to the producers of the show. Also, she returned for an episode considering the departure of Paget Brewster from the series.

Ed Bernero, the former Criminal Minds executive producer, later alleged that CBS executives had called him and instructed him to fire A.J. Cook and Paget Brewster. In a different interview, Paget Brewster also indicated that Ed Bernero was fired as a result of a call from someone at CBS who claimed they were looking for “new women.” She claimed that since their successor was paid twice as much as they were, it was not because of budget cuts.

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2011-Present

On the 16th of April 2011, there came a report that A.J. Cook had signed to reappear for two more seasons of the show. In 2013, alongside a co-star on Criminal Minds, Kirsten Vangsness, she managed to negotiate a salary increment after several years of being paid less the salary of fellow co-stars, Mathew Gray Gubler and Shemar Moore. In 2017, both women held on signing new contracts as they sought pay parity with their fellow co-stars. Fortunately, they succeeded in their pursuit and closed new deals to return to set.

She continued to star in the series until it ended in 2020 after running for 15 seasons. Following the end of the series, A.J. Cook decided to take a break from acting. In 2022, having returned from her break, she starred on the 9-1-1 show. Later on, it was announced that she would be returning for the revival of Criminal Minds.

A.J. Cook Net Worth

Currently, A.J. Cook’s net worth is estimated at $5 million.

Other Ventures

She was announced to have joined Proactiv as a spokesman in 2013. She was featured in Maxim magazine’s January/February 2014 issue. On the 2014 Maxim Hot 100 list, she came in at position 88. On April 3, 2016, she served as the STP 500’s Grand Marshal at Martinsville Speedway in Martinsville, Virginia.

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Personal Life

Although A.J. Cook was brought up in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, she does not confine her acting to parts that express Mormon views. She got married to Nathan Andersen, her longtime partner, on August 3, 2001. Before then, she relocated to Salt Lake City, Utah, to be with him after they first met in a film class at Utah Valley University. They have two sons and live in Los Angeles, California.

Their first child, Mekhai Allan, was born in September 2008. He played Henry LaMontagne on every episode of Criminal Minds. Phoenix Sky, the couple’s second son, was born in July 2015. He was given the name Phoenix by A.J. Cook and her husband because, despite being told they couldn’t have any more children, Phoenix surprised them and “simply rose up.” In Criminal Minds, he played Michael, Jennifer Jareau’s second son.