Person
Janet Leigh
Merced, California, USA
Janet Leigh (born Jeanette Helen Morrison; July 6, 1927 – October 3, 2004) was an American actress, singer, dancer, and author. Her career spanned over five decades. Raised in Sto…
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Janet Leigh (born Jeanette Helen Morrison; July 6, 1927 – October 3, 2004) was an American actress, singer, dancer, and author. Her career spanned over five decades. Raised in Stockton, California, by working-class parents, Leigh was discovered at 18 by actress Norma Shearer, who helped her secure a contract with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Leigh appeared in radio programs before her first formal foray into acting, making her film debut in the drama The Romance of Rosy Ridge (1947). With MGM, she appeared in many films which spanned a wide variety of genres, which include the crime-drama Act of Violence (1948), the drama Little Women (1949), the comedy Angels in the Outfield (1951), the romance Scaramouche (1952) and the western drama The Naked Spur (1953). She played dramatic roles during the late 1950s, in such films as Safari (1956) and Orson Welles's film noir Touch of Evil (1958). With RKO Radio pictures she co-starred in the romantic comedy Holiday Affair (1949) with Robert Mitchum. Leigh achieved her biggest success starring as Marion Crane in Alfred Hitchcock's psychological thriller Psycho (1960). For her performance, Leigh won the Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actress and earned a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress. Intermittently, she continued to appear in films, including Bye Bye Birdie (1963), Harper (1966), Night of the Lepus (1972), and Boardwalk (1979). She made her Broadway debut in 1975 in a production of Murder Among Friends. She would also go on to appear in two horror films with her daughter, Jamie Lee Curtis: The Fog (1980) and Halloween H20: 20 Years Later (1998). In addition to her work as an actress, Leigh also wrote four books between 1984 and 2002, two of which were novels. Leigh had two brief marriages as a teenager (one of which was annulled) before marrying actor Tony Curtis in 1951. The pair's highly publicized union ended in divorce in 1962, and after starring in The Manchurian Candidate that same year, Leigh remarried and scaled back her career. She died in October 2004 at age 77, following a year-long battle with vasculitis, an inflammation of the blood vessels.
Filmography
Movies and shows, newest first
- 2026
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2025
Jaws @ 50: The Definitive Inside Story
Movie Self (archive footage)
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2023
Pictures of Ghosts
Movie Self (archive footage)
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2022
Jamie Lee Curtis: Hollywood Call of Freedom
Movie Self (archive footage)
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2022
Rat Pack
Movie Self (archive footage)
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2021
I Am Alfred Hitchcock
Movie Self (archive footage)
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2019
Emergency: Donald Trump’s "Touch of Evil"
Movie (archive footage)
- 2018
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2017
The Fabulous Allan Carr
Movie Self (archive)
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2012
Fascination: Unauthorized Story of Marilyn Monroe
Movie Self (archive footage)
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2005
The Making of 'Psycho'
Movie Self
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2005
Bad Girls from Valley High
Movie Mrs. Witt
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2002
Tales from the Mist: Inside 'The Fog'
Movie Self
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2000
Mary Pickford: A Life on Film
Movie Self
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2000
The American Nightmare
Movie Self
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2000
Howard Hughes: His Women and His Movies
Movie Self
More credits
-
2000
Cubby Broccoli: The Man Behind Bond
Movie Herself
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1999
Rat Pack: A Conference of Cool
Movie Self
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1999
Hitchcock: Shadow of a Genius
Movie Self
- 1999
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1999
Family Law
TV show Mary Sawyer
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1999
Anthony Perkins: A Life in the Shadows
Movie Self
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1998
Halloween H20: 20 Years Later
Movie Norma
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1998
Unmasking the Horror
Movie
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1997
In My Sister's Shadow
Movie Kay Connor
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1997
Scene by Scene
TV show Self
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1996
E! True Hollywood Story
TV show
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1996
Jerry Lewis: The Last American Clown
Movie Self - Interviewee
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1995
Inside the Dream Factory
Movie Self
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1995
Charlton Heston: For All Seasons
Movie Self
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1995
Secret Lives
TV show
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1994
Touched by an Angel
TV show Vera King
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1994
The Story of Lassie
Movie Self
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1994
Hitchcock: Alfred the Great
Movie Himself
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1993
Intimate Portrait
TV show Self (archive footage)
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1993
The Egg
Movie The egg (voice) (archive footage)
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1987
Happy 100th Birthday, Hollywood
Movie Self
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1986
The Fantasy Film Worlds of George Pal
Movie Self
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1986
The Making Of Psycho III
Movie Marion Crane (archive footage)
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1986
Psycho III
Movie Marion Crane (archive footage) (uncredited)
