After a talent manager sees her photo in a friend's portfolio, Miami-born, L.A.-bred Mendes, a marketing major at California State Northridge, drops out of school to go on auditions. "I never did drama in high school or anything," she tells the Toronto Sun in 2003. "When you grow up in L.A., everybody is either a wannabe director or a producer or has a friend – so I got a lot of, 'Your look is interesting, you should be a model or act,' and it never caught my attention."
