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Born the daughter of a university professor and a gynocologist, Claudia Black entered the world on October 12, 1972; however there has been some dispute over her actual birth year. From a young age, she showed an aptitude for performance, starring in her first play in kindergarten as the narrator. Claudia attended just short of three weeks of university before dropping out and telling her parents she was going to become an actress. She describes herself as the "black sheep" of the family, since she was the only one who did not graduate from university.

Claudia has participated in Australian television and movies. She portrayed a hermaphrodite named Jill Mayhew in the Australian television series "Good Guys Bad Guys". She also had a leading role in the New Zealand soap opera City Life playing the role of Greek lawyer Angela Kostapas. Her breakthrough role was playing Aeryn Sun on the sci-fi hit "Farscape". For her role in "Farscape", Black was nominated Best Actress by Saturn Award in 2001 and 2002, and won the award in 2005. She has appeared in the feature films Queen of the Damned and Pitch Black. Starting in season 8, Black appeared as the character of Vala Mal Doran in "Stargate SG-1". At first, she was a guest-star for the episode "Prometheus Unbound", but was brought back for six episodes in season nine, and became a regular cast member in season ten. In 2004, she was voted "#7 Hottest Scifi Babe" by Scifi WorldNet.

In the fall 2007 NBC TV show "Life" Black was cast in the supporting role of Jennifer Conover for the initial pilot. Due to Claudia's second pregnancy, the part was recast and the role was given to actress Jennifer Siebel when the series was picked up. Interestingly, NBC still used footage of Black, and none of Siebel, when promoting the show's debut.

Black has also appeared in theatre. She once played Portia in a tour of the Merchant of Venice. She has also had parts in "Spotlight On Women," "Portrait Of Dorian Gray," "Loose Ends," and "Pick Ups" for the Belvoir Street Theatre; "Little Women" and "The World Knot" for the Bicentennial Opera.

Black is also a professional singer of jazz and classical music and is often admired for her exotic speaking voice. Popular at sci-fi conventions, Black showed her talent at singing and playing the guitar at the Burbank Farscape convention in 2003. She has admitted to being terrified before the performance and has declined requests for her to sing since. However, her vocal talent can be heard in the track "Groovy" on Paul Goddard's CD "2am Flight".

She currently resides in Los Angles with her husband, Jamie, and two sons, Odin and Viggo.