‘My career was not handed to me on a plate’ says Jamie Lee Curtis

Actress Jamie Lee Curtis has said that her career was not ‘handed to her on a plate’. The 63-year-old actress is the daughter of late Hollywood legends Tony Curtis and Janet Leigh, but has often felt ‘oppressed’ by the notion that her own successful career in film is due to her family connections.

She said, “The only thing I’ve ever found oppressive was people thinking that my career was all because of my family, all connected to having Janet Leigh and Tony Curtis as parents. That whatever little ecosystem I’d created had somehow been handed to me on a plate. That’s the perception I had to fight against, kick against.”

The Freaky Friday star got her big screen break at 19 playing Laurie Strode in the 1978 film Halloween.

She shared, “But my mother came from nothing… Nothing. She was very educated but poor. She was discovered by Norma Shearer, the silent film star. She came to Hollywood; she (real name was Jeanette Morrison) became Janet Leigh. And so my mother would never have complained about being burdened or limited by Marion Crane because that role gave her an Oscar nomination and a fantastic life. It was a huge honour for her, just as this one (Halloween) is for me.” —IANS