Born and raised in New York City, Sara Rue, the eldest of two daughters, spent most of her childhood backstage with one or both of her parents, who were very active in the Broadway theatre community, both on and off stage.

Rue's acting career began at age nine, when she appeared in the film Rocket Gibraltar. Shortly thereafter she won critical acclaim for her television series debut, starring in the comedy Grand. Since then she has appeared as a series regular on various shows, including Phenom, Minor Adjustments, Zoe, Duncan, Jack & Jane and Popular. She has also been seen in many guest and recurring roles on shows such as ER, Will & Grace and The Division, to name a few.

Her film career has soared in the past few years. Rue will star in A Slipping Down Life. She starred in A Map of the World and appeared as a scene-stealing social misfit in Can't Hardly Wait. She was also cast in Pearl Harbor as a tough-talking nurse. Originally there was no role for the young actress, but she so impressed Michael Bay that he flew her to Hawaii, threw her in the scenes with the nurses and told her to "improvise and be funny," which she did. That same summer she received rave reviews across the board for her portrayal of the title character in the film Gypsy 83, where she played an aspiring singer/songwriter and obsessive Stevie Nicks fan. She has just completed production on the new Untitled Mike Judge Film, starring Luke Wilson, where she plays the Attorney General of the United States.

On stage Rue starred at the Ensemble Studio Theatre's (NYC) one-act festival two years in a row in productions of The Shallow End and Seventh Word, Four Syllables. In conjunction with shooting two television pilots and a feature film in Spring 1999, Rue made her Los Angeles theatre debut at the Matrix Theatre in the play The Water Children, which dealt with the controversial issues of abortion and a woman's right to choose.