Melissa Leo
Melissa Leo
Melissa Chessington Leois an American actress. After appearing on several television shows and films in the 1980s, her breakthrough role came in 1993 as Det. Sgt. Kay Howard on the television series Homicide: Life on the Street for the show's first five seasons. She had also previously been a regular on the television shows All My Children and The Young Riders...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionMovie Actress
Date of Birth14 September 1960
CityNew York City, NY
CountryUnited States of America
I'm a very lucky girl who gets to act for a living! So why sit around griping and grousing about what's not there.
I'm not particularly fond of the hybrid writer-director or actor-director.
I love acting. I really do. I think that's maybe the one thing that is known about me.
The director is the captain of the ship, without question. No matter what their talent or energy level is, everyone on the crew has all eyes on the captain. If they come in going, "I don't know. Maybe we'll do this. Maybe we'll do that," you've got 10 days to shoot and they don't care what you're doing.
You have this certain about of responsibility to play a fictitious character and you have a script that's guiding you and the other information of the custom department's choices, and the set department, "Where are you", and all those other pieces of information but you have to cull from your imagination the answer to all the unasked questions. And with a real person, there's someone to get that information from, perhaps.
It's not exactly an interview that's going on [in documentary]. I guess we do ask Edward Snowden some questions and we're recording him answering them and so on like that.
I'm going to show you I haven't given you permission because clearly you're not grown up enough to understand that, not having given you permission, you can't just come look in my house." And I won't know if they're coming and looking or not...so I put a piece of tape over it.
An actor has to be very, very careful, as one of the most wonderful props - and actors love props - is a cigarette. There's so much to do with it: you can bring it up to your face, play with the smoke. It's just the greatest - ever since I was 16 and in acting school in England, I've been playing around with cigarettes.
Being an actor on a movie set is like going to the playground at recess.
I do, however, have tape over my eyepiece as well. What I think my peace is saying isn't, "Oh I have something to hide. I don't want you to look.", it's more saying, "No thank you. I prefer you not look. I'm not giving you permission.
I am a smoker, I'm ashamed to say. I had given it up for many years, then picked it up again. It's a horrible habit. I struggle with myself all the time. And I love to smoke.
The climate informs the character.
I have some close friends I keep in touch with. I knit. I watch a little too much TV. I ski, if the weather's right for that. If I can find a group of buddies, I go rock climbing.
I don't tend to use technology all that much. Of course, I can't avoid it - it's called the telephone nowadays. And I do a certain amount of email, work-related primarily, on it. But I don't do a lot of looking for things online.