During the course of her work in the play, Milano and her mother were on the road for 18 months. She was one of four selected from more than 1,500 girls. Milano began her career at age seven, when her babysitter, without notifying her parents, took her to an audition for the national touring company of Annie. She is of Italian descent and has a brother named Cory, who is a decade younger. Alyssa Jayne Milano was born in the Bensonhurst neighborhood of New York City's Brooklyn borough on December 19, 1972, the daughter of fashion designer and talent manager Lin Milano and film music editor Thomas M.