Janet Leigh is one of the true legendary actresses in cinematic history and there are lots of things you didn’t know. Leigh worked with some of the world’s greatest directors like Alfred Hitchcock, Orson Welles, and John Carpenter. The actress rose to fame after playing Marion Crane in 1960’s horror classic, Psycho, and went on to cement her feet in Hollywood history with a number of unforgettable roles.
Leigh had a love for film from a very early age, and would spend hours upon hours on her own at movie theaters, fully immersing herself in cinema. As a student, she studied music and psychology at the University of the Pacific. However, it would be her acting talent that she would later be recognised for. Here’s six things you didn’t know about Psycho’s Janet Leigh.
1. Janet Leigh Was Nominated For An Oscar For Her Most Memorable Role
The terrifying shower scene in Alfred Hitchcock’s Psycho will forever be a standout sequence in movie history. It catapulted Leigh into a new league of fame and put horror movies on the map, influencing many horror movies thereafter. While the Oscars typically don’t honor horror movies and lean more towards dramas, Leigh was recognized for her tremendous acting and was nominated for Best Actress in a Supporting Role in 1961. Leigh didn’t take home the gold that year but her role as Marion Crane is still well and truly engraved in horror movie culture. Leigh went on to be known as the original “scream queen” of cinema.
2. Janet Leigh’s Creativity Didn’t End On The Screen
There’s no doubt that Janet Leigh’s presence on screen was always massive and captivating. She dominated the screen anytime she was on it, and with such eloquent ease, but her talent didn’t begin or end there. Leigh was also a published author and wrote four books between 1984 and 2002.
Leigh’s first book was an autobiography titled “There Really Was a Hollywood“. She then went on to share her stories from the set of the classic movie, Psycho, with “Psycho: Behind the Scenes of the Classic Thriller” which she co-wrote with Christopher Nickens. Leigh then went on to write two novels; “House of Destiny” in 1996 and her final book, “The Dream Factory” in 2002. Leigh received heaps of praise for her books and proved herself as a gifted writer as well as an actress.
3. Janet Leigh’s Daughter Is An Oscar Winning Actress
Jamie Lee Curtis is an Oscar winning actress and star of movies such as Everything Everywhere All At Once, True Lies and Trading Places. Curtis is perhaps most known for her breakout role as Laurie Strode in John Carpenter’s Halloween in 1978. Her role as the timid small-town babysitter who is relentlessly stalked and pursued by psychotic killer Michael Myers, shot her fame and crowned her the next “scream queen”, ironically taking the crown from her mother, Janet Leigh.
Janet Leigh gave birth to Jamie Lee Curtis on November 22, 1958. Jamie Lee’s father is iconic Oscar-nominated actor, Tony Curtis, who was married to Leigh until they divorced in 1962.
4. She Appeared In Two Horror Movies With Her Daughter
After Jamie Lee Curtis was crowned as a “scream queen” in 1978, she went on to reteam with horror legend John Carpenter in 1980’s The Fog. This also marked Janet Leigh’s first collaboration with Carpenter and the first time she had ever appeared on screen with her daughter.
After making horror movie history, placing two generations of scream queens in a horror movie together, the mother-and-daughter duo didn’t appear on screen together for another 18 years. In 1998, Leigh and Curtis appeared together once more in Halloween H20: Twenty Years Later. Leigh’s role was small and perhaps in the “blink and you might miss it” territory, but horror movie fanatics appreciated it nonetheless.
5. Janet Leigh Turned Down The Chance To Reteam With Stanley Kubrick
Psycho was a huge success and was nominated for four Oscars in 1961. Upon this glaring success, Alfred Hitchcock was now the hottest director in cinema and Janet Leigh had reached new heights of fame. The cinematic universe was waiting for the two to pair up again, but unfortunately it never happened. However, this wasn’t for lack of trying on Hitchcock’s part.
Hitchcock offered Leigh the role of Charlotte Haze in Lolita, but Leigh reportedly was so offended that she turned down the role and Shelley Winters stepped in. Leigh was unhappy with the size of the role and felt it was not the right part for an actress fresh off the success of a box office smash like Psycho. This isn’t the only iconic role Leigh would reject during her career either – she was also offered the part of Simone Clouseau in The Pink Panther, but turned it down as she did not want to film in Europe and be away from her family.
6. Scarlett Johansson Played Janet Leigh In A Movie
In 2012, Sacha Gervasi’s biopic Hitchcock, starring Anthony Hopkins and Helen Mirren, opened to mixed reviews. A biography picture of sorts, the main focus of the movie centered around the relationship of Alfred Hitchcock and his wife Alma Reville, as Hitchcock began filming Psycho in 1959. With Psycho being a key element of the movie, of course the hunt would be on to find the perfect actress to portray the scream queen, Janet Leigh.
Scarlett Johansson was cast as Leigh and while she received mixed reviews and opinions on the role, Leigh’s daughter Jamie Lee Curtis, fully approved. Telling Entertainment Tonight:
“I have always admired her way prior to her playing my mother in the Hitchcock movie. I’ve always just thought of her as — I don’t want to say fearless, because she’s been so vulnerable onscreen that she has shown great empathy and emotion. But she’s just, excuse my French, effing cool. She’s cool.”
Read Next: 8 Things You Didn’t Know About Halloween’s Jamie Lee Curtis