Early life and career

Garcia was born on November 12, 1973 on an Alabama army base. Her parents are Janelle "Nelle" Garcia and Major John Garcia, USA - Ret., both of whom are of Puerto Rican descent. John flew aircraft in the U.S. military; Nelle, a school and dance teacher, passed her dancing skills along to Mayte. Garcia and her older sister, Janice, grew up in both Germany and the USA. Garcia spent the summers of her childhood with her extended family in San Juan, Puerto Rico. She is Catholic, and is fluent in English, German, and Spanish. She began belly dancing at age three and became a professional at age eight, at which age she appeared on the American television program That's Incredible! as the world's youngest professional belly dancer. She graduated from General H. H. Arnold High School in Wiesbaden, Germany.

Career and professional relationship with Prince

Garcia first came to the attention of Prince in 1990, when her mother, Nelle, submitted a video cassette of Garcia's performance. Prince met the young dancer during the same year while on tour in Germany, and eventually she was hired to dance on his Diamonds and Pearls Tour. She became the focus of his next album, Love Symbol, and she assumed the guise of an Egyptian princess for the concept album and the 3 Chains o' Gold video compilation.

Garcia was in The NPG from late 1991 to 1996. Afterwards, she remained an associate of the NPG.

In 1995, Prince produced an album for her, titled Child of the Sun, for a European release on his NPG Records label. This album was noted for the single "If I Love U 2 Nite".

In 1997, she was the artistic director of the New Power Generation Dance Company on their Around the World in a Day tour. But, due to lack of funds, the initiative did not succeed.

She also directed the music videos for "The One" for Prince and for other artists like Chaka Khan and Graham Central Station. All three collaborated in 1997-1998.

She choreographed the belly dancing routines that Britney Spears danced for her music video "I'm a Slave 4 U" (2001) as well as Spears' performance at the MTV Video Music Awards.

Films

Film appearances include the Hindi film Dus (2005), as a dancer, and Firehouse Dog (2007).

Television

García has guest starred on various television series, such as Psych, The Closer, Las Vegas, Nip/Tuck, and Keeping Up with the Kardashians. She appeared twice as a reporter on the 2007 ABC television series Big Shots, and she had a recurring role on Lifetime's Army Wives (2008-2009) as Jennifer Connor.

She starred on Sí TV's 2004-05 program Across the Hall with Eric Cubiche. In 2009, she was a judge on the first season of Oxygen's Dance Your Ass Off. On June 25, 2012, she began appearing as a principal cast member on VH1's reality show Hollywood Exes.

Personal life

On Valentine's Day in 1996, Garcia, then 22, married Prince, then 37, in Minneapolis..

Two months later, Garcia discovered she was pregnant. The child (named Boy Gregory) was born on 16 October 1996, and died a week later due to Pfeiffer syndrome, which is rare skull defect. In a later interview, Garcia stated that she and Prince also lost a pregnancy early on to a miscarriage. In 1998, Prince announced the couple's divorce, eventually filing in June 2000.

Garcia had a relationship with Mötley Crüe drummer Tommy Lee, from 2000 until 2002. Currently, she lives in Los Angeles with her adopted daughter Gia.

[ Source: Wikipedia ]