Jamie Lee Curtis
Jamie Lee Curtis (born
November 22,
1958) is a
Golden Globe-winning
American film actress and a successful author of books for children. Although she was initially known as a "
scream queen", because of her starring roles in many horror films early in her career, Curtis has since compiled a body of work that covers every genre. Through marriage, she is
Baroness Haden-Guest in the
British peerage, so is entitled to be called
Lady Haden-Guest, although she does not use this title.
Curtis was born in
Los Angeles, California, the child of well-known actors
Tony Curtis and
Janet Leigh. Her paternal grandparents were
Jewish immigrants from
Hungary. Her parents divorced in 1962 and her mother remarried to a Robert Brandt. She has an older sister,
Kelly Curtis, who is also an actress, and several half-siblings (all from her father's remarriage), Alexandra, Allegra, Ben, and Nicholas Curtis (who died in 1994 of a drug overdose).
Curtis attended both
Westlake School for Girls in Los Angeles and Beverly Hills High School, but graduated from
Choate Rosemary Hall. She returned to
California in 1976. She attended the
University of the Pacific in
Stockton, California, where she considered majoring in social work, but left after a semester in order to pursue an acting career.
Universal Studios put her under contract, and she starred in the
television series,
Operation Petticoat.
Film
Curtis made her film debut in the
1978 horror film Halloween, playing the role of Laurie Strode, the only teenage character in the film who is not killed. The film was a major success and was considered the highest grossing
independent film of its time. Curtis was subsequently cast in several horror films, which led to her association with the horror genre, garnering her the title of a "
scream queen".
Her first follow-up to
Halloween was the horror film,
The Fog, which was directed by "Halloween" director
John Carpenter. The film opened in
February 1980 to mixed reviews but strong box office,
further cementing Curtis as a horror film starlet. Her next film,
Prom Night, was a low-budget
Canadian slasher film and was released in July
1980. The film, for which she earned a
Genie Award nomination for Best Performance by a Foreign Actress, was considered similar in style to
Halloween, and received negative reviews which marked it as a disposable entry in the then active "slasher film" genre. That year, Curtis also starred in
Terror Train, which opened in
October and received a negative reaction akin to
Prom Night. Both films performed only moderately at the box office.
Curtis had a similar function in both films - playing the main character whose friends are murdered, and who is practically the only protagonist to survive. Film critic
Roger Ebert, who had given negative reviews to all three of Curtis' 1980 films, said that Curtis "is to the current horror film glut what
Christopher Lee was to the last one-or
Boris Karloff was in the 1930s."
. Curtis later appeared in
Halloween II,
Halloween H20: 20 Years Later and
Halloween: Resurrection.
Her role in 1983's
Trading Places established her as more than just a horror queen and 1988's
A Fish Called Wanda achieved near cult status -- while showcasing her as a first rate comic actress. She won a Golden Globe for her work in 1994's
True Lies.
Her recent successful film roles for Curtis have included
Disney's Freaky Friday (2003), opposite
Lindsay Lohan. The movie was filmed at Palisades High School in
Pacific Palisades, CA, near where Curtis and Guest make their home with their children. She was nominated for a
Golden Globe Award for Best Actress - Motion Picture Musical or Comedy in this movie.
Television
In television, Curtis co-starred opposite
Richard Lewis in the situation comedy
Anything But Love. Her role as Hannah Miller received both a
Golden Globe and
People's Choice Award. She also earned a Golden Globe nomination for her work in TNT's adaptation of the
Wendy Wasserstein play
The Heidi Chronicles. More recently, Curtis starred in the CBS television movie
Nicholas' Gift, for which she received an
Emmy nomination.
Children's Books
Working with illustrator, Laura Cornell, Curtis has written a number of critically-acclaimed children's books. These include:
When I was Little: A Four-Year Old's Memoir Of Her Youth, published September 1993.
Tell Me Again About The Night I was Born, published August 1996.
*
Today I Feel Silly, and Other Moods That Make My Day, published September 1998, which was listed on the
New York Times best-seller list for nine weeks.
Where Do Balloons Go?: An Uplifting Mystery, published August 2000.
I'm Gonna Like Me: Letting Off a Little Self-Esteem, published September 2002.
It's Hard to Be Five: Learning How to Work My Control Panel, published September 2004.
Is There Really A Human Race?, published September 2006.
Curtis married actor
Christopher Guest on
December 18,
1984, becoming Lady Haden-Guest when her husband inherited the
Barony of Haden-Guest in 1996, upon the death of his father. The couple have two adopted children, Anne Haden Guest (born 1986) and Thomas Haden Guest (born 1996). Curtis is also actor
Jake Gyllenhaal's
godmother.
Today, Curtis also takes time to support various philanthropic groups. She was Guest of Honor at the 11th annual Gala and Fundraiser in 2003 for Women in Recovery, Inc., a
Venice, CA-based non-profit organization offering a live-in,
twelve-step program of rehabilitation for women in need. Past Honorees of this organization have included
Sir Anthony Hopkins; the 2005 honoree was
Angela Lansbury.
Footnotes
Web sites
