Biography

Born and bred in Singapore, Vanessa graduated in 2011 from Nanyang Technological University where she majored in English Literature and minored in Drama and Performance. After being involved in junior college and university plays, she joined Singapore Repertory Theatre's Young Company in 2010, where she trained for two years. Her theatre credits include: "Love & Other Oddities" (Theatre Lab Productions), "Grimm Tales" (Singapore Repertory Theatre), "Ai Si" (Little Red Shop), "Off Centre" and "Fat Pig" (Yellow Chair Productions) and "ABCD: FourPlays" (Theatreworks and Vertical Submarine). Vanessa has guest-starred in local TV dramas including "Code of Law", "In Cold Blood", "Spouse for House" and "Rules of Tham". In 2013, she appeared in 4 episodes of the award-winning webseries "What Do Men Want" and had a lead role in popular local webseries, "Get Social". She also made her silver screen debut that year with Ken Kwek's "Sex.Violence.Family Values", in which she played a teenage pole-dancer. She will next appear in Netflix's highly anticipated series "Marco Polo", which premieres on December 12th 2014. In addition, Vanessa is also a host and TV presenter. Some of her presenting credits include reality singing competition "The Final 1" (2013, Mediacorp), "Lunchtime Primetime" (2012, Toggle Eve), "The Standard Chartered Marathon Singapore" (2012, 2013, SuperSports Arena), BNP Paribas WTA Finals Singapore (2014, World Sport Group, WTA) and is a regular presenter on Fox Sports Asia (2014).
- IMDb mini biography by: Vanessa Vanderstraaten

[expectations of love] As I grow older, I realize the expectations many of us place on our partners border on unrealistic and naive. Perhaps a dose of good ol' tough love, a la Joan Rivers bon mot style, might do the trick and cause us to rethink our perspectives.

[social media] I hate it when people hashtag their names! It's so narcissistic.