Téa Leoni
Téa Leoni
Ghost Town, Spanglish, Jurassic Park III, Deep Impact
Téa Leoni is an actress of extraordinary versatility and charm, who has portrayed an impressive list of characters on the screen. Born in New York City, she became interested in acting through the influence of her grandmother, a former Broadway actress. Nicknamed Sarah Bernhardt because of her melodramatic tendencies, Téa didn't pursue her craft immediately. Instead, she studied anthropology and psychology at Sarah Lawrence and then took time off from school to travel, living in Tokyo and Italy on St. Croix. Upon her return to New York, she went on her first audition.
Competing with thousands of actresses, she landed one of the coveted roles in Angels 89, a Charlie's Angels spinoff but the show never aired. She began to study her craft and the following year, she starred as Lisa DiNapoli in the TV daytime drama Santa Barbara. After years of small roles in films and television, she hit it big as a reluctant paparazzo in the offbeat TV comedy series The Naked Truth (1995-98).
She went on to star in films such as Bad Boys (with Will Smith), People I know (with Al Pacino and Kim Basinger), Woody Allen's Hollywood Ending (also her co-star in this film), the major box office hit, Jurassic Park III (with Sam Neill, William H. Macy, and Alessandro Nivola), The Family Man (with Nicolas Cage), and in one of 1998's most successful films, Deep Impact with Morgan Freeman and Vanessa Redgrave.
She starred opposite Adam Sander and Paz Vega in the James L. Brooks film Spanglish in 2004.
In 2005, Téa starred opposite Jim Carrey in Fun with Dick and Jane, a comedy about a husband and wife who turn to robbery as a last resort to pay their bills. That same year, she played Mrs. Warshaw in her husband David Duchovny's writing and directorial debut, House of D. The film tells a story of a man who discovers who he really is by working through problems stemming from his past.
In 2007 she played opposite Ben Kingsley and Luke Wilson in You Kill Me. She was also an executive producer on the film, a mob comedy in which Kingsley played an alcoholic hitman who moves to San Francisco to become sober by attending AA meetings, getting a sponsor and landing a job in a mortuary, where he meets and falls in love with Leoni's character.
She most recently played widow Gwen in Ghost Town (2008) opposite Ricky Gervais and Greg Kinnear.
Téa Leoni was appointed U.S. Fund for UNICEF Ambassador in 2001. A third-generation UNICEF volunteer — her grandmother Helenka Pantaleoni founded the U.S. Fund for UNICEF — she continues a 50-year family tradition of improving the lives of children worldwide. Anthony Pantaleoni, Leoni's father, currently serves on the U.S. Fund for UNICEF's board. In 2004, she and her father traveled to observe UNICEF programs in Honduras, and in October 2005 they visited UNICEF-supported HIV/AIDS programs in Viet Nam.
Téa Leoni at the Internet Movie Database