A professional actor since
the age of nine, Jennifer Jason Leigh earned her Screen Actors Guild card at 16
and dropped out of high school to study at the Lee Strasberg Institute and star
in seedy made-for-TV movies.
Throughout
her career, she has made a name for herself portraying helpless, damaged, or mentally
unsound characters, often performing at a higher level than the material. Also
known for extensively researching her roles, Leigh dropped down to less than 90
pounds for one of her first features as an anorexic teenager in the TV-movie The
Best Little Girl in the World. Never one to shy away from touchy subject matter,
her breakthrough role came in 1982 as the naïve high school girl who gets
an abortion in Fast Times at Ridgemont High.
Not
limiting herself to dramas, Leigh appeared as an isolated computer programmer
in David Cronenberg's thriller eXistenZ and as an over-the-top mom in the comedy
Skipped Parts. Around that time, she also appeared on-stage in Broadway and off-Broadway
plays, most notably as dancer Sally Bowles in Cabaret.
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Jennifer Jason Leigh Nude Gallery