Jennifer Jason Leigh's Arc

Jennifer Jason Leigh (2/5/62-) had her first big hit with Fast Times at Ridgemont High (1982), a movie that's still fun after a quarter century (that's right).

From there, of those I've seen, she rambled and gamboled her way though a variety of memorable efforts such as in the horrifying Last Exit to Brooklyn (1990); the scary Single White Female (1992); the hip Raymond Carver-based Short Cuts (1993); the droll Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle (1994); or wired and neurotic in Dolores Claiborne (1995). Next came her perfect signature performance in Georgia (1995), followed by the dark Kansas City (1996), Washington Square (1997), and The Anniversary Party (2001) -- which seems like yesterday even though she's already made another five or six films that I haven't caught yet.

Of all her roles, my overall favorite so far is her tour de force performance in Georgia. To translate the German from the DVD case shown above: "Two sisters. Two lives. One misery." That about sums it up.

Jennifer Jason Lee was originally named Jennifer Lee Morrow; she's the daughter of Vic Morrow (2/14/29-7/23/82) and Barbara Turner (7/14/36-). The "Jason" part of her created persona was derived from Jason Robards; Leigh, we might guess, is from Vivien. Very catchy and deliberately so.

I well remember Vic Morrow (along with Sidney Poitier) in The Blackboard Jungle (1955) and in the cheesy but entertaining Combat tv series from the 1960s. I vaguely recall stories of him going on alcohol-fueled rampages, but this could have been hearsay. In any case, he died in a freakish helicopter crash during the filming of The Twilight Zone movie (1983) along with two small children playing Vietnamese refugees.

Barbara Turner was married (1957-1964) to Vic Morrow when they had their two daughters, Jennifer and Carrie Ann Morrow. Her second marriage (1968-1985) to Iranian director Reza Badiyi produced Mina Badie, another actor. Turner has devoted most of her career to writing for tv, theatre, and the movies. She teamed up with daughter Jennifer for the production of Georgia, which she wrote. She also wrote the high impact screenplay for Pollock (2000).

Around the time of The Anniversary Party's release, Jennifer Jason Leigh hooked up with writer-director Noah Baumbach, whose most recent effort is the flinchingly interesting film about writers, The Squid and the Whale (2005). They married each other last September. Good luck to them!

This quick entry reminds me to check out eXistenZ (1999) and others in JJL's growing catalog.

Ciao!