Dies at 36 years old Hayden Panettiere, actress of 'Heroes' and 'Nashville'

American actress Hayden Panettiere died this Sunday at the age of 36, according to sources close to her confirmed to People magazine. The family has not reported the cause of death and has requested privacy while the circumstances of the death are investigated.

Panettiere became internationally known for the role of Claire Bennet in Heroes, the series aired between 2006 and 2010, where she played a high school cheerleader with regeneration powers. She also starred for six seasons in the musical series Nashville, in addition to participating in films such as A Bug's Life, Bring It On, Scream 4, and Scream 6. "With deep sadness we communicate the tragic death of our beloved Hayden. She had an incredible light and was a force of nature who brought immeasurable love and joy to everyone who knew her, as well as to the millions of people who saw her on screen," her representative said in a statement sent to ABC.

Born in New York, the daughter of a soap opera actress and a firefighter, she had her first role in 1994, when she was 5 years old. As a child actress, she appeared in series such as Ally McBeal and Malcolm in the Middle. As a teenager, she participated in youth films such as Ice Princess, where she met Michelle Trachtenberg, who died in 2025 at the age of 39. In 2006, she signed for Heroes, which made her famous worldwide. In the series, which aimed to be the new Lost, she played a cheerleader who held the key to saving the world (in fact, the most famous line in the fiction was "Save the cheerleader, save the world"). From 2012 to 2018, she was the co-star alongside Connie Britton of Nashville, set in the world of country music and for which she received two Golden Globe nominations for best supporting actress.

Her younger brother, Jansen Panettiere, also an actor, died in February 2023 at the age of 28 from a heart condition. In recent months, Hayden Panettiere had resumed public activity with the publication of her memoirs, This Is Me: A Reckoning, in which she reviewed her career and some of the most difficult episodes of her life, such as her strained relationship with her mother or the abuse she suffered in Hollywood. She also suffered from alcoholism and opioid addiction, which led her to enter a detoxification clinic in 2020. In an interview with People magazine, on the occasion of her recovery, Panattiere said: "I was on top of the world and I messed it up. I thought I had hit rock bottom, but then a trapdoor opened. I've had to work hard on myself and I've had to be willing to be very honest." She added: "There have been many ups and downs, but I don't regret even the most unpleasant things that have happened to me." The actress had a daughter, Kaya, in 2014 with Ukrainian ex-boxer Wladimir Klitschko, to whom she gave custody of the child due to her addiction problems and postpartum depression.