ACTOR · BORN 1960
Melissa Leo
- Born
- 14 September 1960
19 archived facts 4 topics 1 source Last reviewed Sep 2026
All facts (19)
- #001
Melissa Leo beat out Julia Roberts for the role of Linda Warner on the soap opera All My Children (1970).
- #002
In March 1997, her former boyfriend John Heard was charged with harassing Melissa Leo through misuse of a telephone and trespassing.
- #003
For her performance in 21 Grams (2003), she placed second for the 2004 Los Angeles Film Critics Association Award for Best Supporting Actress.
- #004
She is a natural redhead.
- #005
Although she appeared and was billed as Mamie Eisenhower in the first trailers for Lee Daniels' The Butler (2013), her role was ultimately cut from the film.
- #006
She was 26 years old when she gave birth to her first child, John Matthew "Jack" Heard III, on June 17, 1987. Jack's father was John Heard.
- #007
According to Rob Lowe's biography "Stories I Only Tell My Friends," he screen-tested with Melissa Leo, who was in serious contention for the role of "Debbie" in About Last Night (1986). In the end, however, the role went to Demi Moore.
- #008
For her work in Frozen River (2008), she won the 2008 Utah Film Critics Association Award for Best Actress Performance.
- #009
She attended the State University of New York at Purchase (SUNY Purchase). Other alumni include actors Parker Posey, Wesley Snipes, Stanley Tucci, Sherry Stringfield, Adam Trese, Edie Falco, Seth Gilliam, King Mustafa Obafemi and Steven Weber; producers Bob Gosse and Todd Baker; and directors Danny Leiner, Nick Gomez and Hal Hartley.
- #010
She became the 137th actor to win an Oscar, taking the Best Supporting Actress Oscar for The Fighter (2010) at the 83rd Annual Academy Awards (2011) on February 27, 2011.
- #011
She is of German, English and distant Scottish descent. Her surname is German and comes from the German immigrant Gustave Leo.
- #012
Melissa Leo studied at the State University of New York at Purchase but did not graduate.
- #013
She is one of three actresses to have won both the Best Supporting Actress Oscar (for The Fighter (2010)) and the Emmy for Outstanding Guest Actress in a Comedy Series (for Louie (2010)). The other actresses are Cloris Leachman and Eileen Heckart.
- #014
Her mother, Peggy Chessington Leo, was a California teacher, and her father, Arnold Leo, was an editor at Grove Press and a fisherman's spokesman for the East Hampton Baymen's Association.
- #015
She won the Oscar for her role as Alice Eklund-Ward in The Fighter (2010), making her one of 17 actors to have won an Oscar for portraying a real person who was still alive on the night of the ceremony (as of 2015). The other sixteen actors and performances are: Spencer Tracy as Father Edward Flanagan in Boys Town (1938), Gary Cooper as Alvin C. York in Sergeant York (1941), Patty Duke as Helen Keller in The Miracle Worker (1962), Jason Robards as Ben Bradlee in All the President's Men (1976), Robert De Niro as Jake La Motta in Raging Bull (1980), Sissy Spacek as Loretta Lynn in Coal Miner's Daughter (1980), Jeremy Irons as Claus Von Bullow in Reversal of Fortune (1990), Susan Sarandon as Sister Helen Prejean in Dead Man Walking (1995), Geoffrey Rush as David Helfgott in Shine (1996), Julia Roberts as Erin Brockovich in Erin Brockovich (2000), Jim Broadbent as John Bayley in Iris (2001), Helen Mirren as Queen Elizabeth II in The Queen (2006), Sandra Bullock as Leigh Anne Tuohy in The Blind Side (2009), Christian Bale as Dickie Eklund in The Fighter (2010), Meryl Streep as Margaret Thatcher in The Iron Lady (2011) and Eddie Redmayne as Stephen Hawking in The Theory of Everything (2014).
- #016
In 2014, she served on the jury at the Sarajevo Film Festival.
- #017
She is one of 22 Oscar-winning actresses born in New York State. The others are Alice Brady, Teresa Wright, Anne Revere, Celeste Holm, Claire Trevor, Judy Holliday, Shirley Booth, Susan Hayward, Patty Duke, Anne Bancroft, Barbra Streisand, Jane Fonda, Lee Grant, Beatrice Straight, Whoopi Goldberg, Mercedes Ruehl, Marisa Tomei, Mira Sorvino, Susan Sarandon, Jennifer Connelly and Anne Hathaway.
- #018
She worked with Kristen Stewart twice: once on The Cake Eaters (2007) and again on Welcome to the Rileys (2010).
- #019
She is from Ulster County, New York.
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