Jennifer Jason Leigh (born February 5, 1962) is an American actress who has appeared in numerous films. Leigh's work has drawn high critical praise. Salon magazine praised her as “one of America’s best actors”, Paul Verhoeven, who directed her in Flesh & Blood, similarly claimed “There is no greater actress working in America”, and in 1994 Vogue magazine claimed “Leigh sets a standard that all future film actresses must attempt to match… (She has) an extraordinary range and power. The proof is in her diverse, courageous and mesmerizing body of work”. She has already received three separate career tributes – at the Telluride Film Festival in 1993, a special award for her contribution to independent cinema from the Film Society of Lincoln Center in 2002, and a week-long retrospective showing of her film work held by the American Cinematheque at Los Angeles’ Egyptian Theatre in June 2001. In addition to these achievements, Leigh was selected as one of "America's 10 Most Beautiful Women" by Harper's Bazaar magazine in 1989.Born Jennifer Lee Morrow in Hollywood, California, she is the daughter of Blackboard Jungle actor Vic Morrow and Pollock screenwriter Barbara Turner, both of whom were Jewish, although Leigh was raised mostly without religion. Leigh changed her middle and last name, taking the middle name "Jason" in honor of family friend, the late actor, Jason Robards, Jr.
At the age of 14 she attended summer acting workshops given by Lee Strasberg and received her Screen Actors Guild membership in an episode of the TV show Baretta when she was 16. An episode of The Waltons and several TV movies followed, including an unusually powerful portrayal of an anorexic teenager in The Best Little Girl in the World, for which Leigh wasted away to a skeletal 86lbs under medical supervision. She made her screen debut as a blind, deaf and mute rape victim in the 1980 slasher flick Eyes of a Stranger. In 1982 she played a teenager who gets pregnant in Amy Heckerling’s popular high-school comedy Fast Times at Ridgemont High, which served as a launching pad for several then-unknown future stars besides Leigh, including Sean Penn, Nicolas Cage, Judge Reinhold, Forest Whitaker, Eric Stoltz, Anthony Edwards, and Phoebe Cates.
Leigh and her boyfriend of four years, Academy Award-nominated independent film writer-director Noah Baumbach (The Squid and the Whale), were married on September 3, 2005. Baumbach is currently shooting Margot at the Wedding starring Leigh opposite Nicole Kidman and Jack Black, due for release on October 19, 2007.
She has been best friends with her Fast Times at Ridgemont High/The Anniversary Party co-star Phoebe Cates for nearly 25 years. Other close friends include Mare Winningham, Jennifer Beals, Alan Cumming and John C. Reilly.
Her step-father is television director Reza Badiyi.
