Leigh Taylor-Young has earned high
acclaim as an Emmy Award winning actress and international personality. She
is as comfortable on a film set as she is at a podium, speaking on behalf of
the Institute for Individual and World Peace.
With fifteen feature films and numerous
television series to her credit, Leigh has also become a major spokesperson
for "corporate" America and many other distinguished organizations. She has
represented the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), as the keynote
speaker in Nairobi, Kenya for the 20th Anniversary ceremonies, the Better
World Society, MCI Corporation, Hands Across America, the American Cancer
Society, the Institute for Individual and World Peace, and hosted the
Muscular Dystrophy Telethon. She is an Advisory Board member for The EduCare
Foundation, a youth leadership training program and The Heartfelt
Foundation.
In her first major role, Leigh starred
opposite Peter Sellers in the theatrical comedy, I Love You, Alice B. Toklas.
Many feature films followed. Some of her best known credits include, Jagged
Edge with Glenn Close and Jeff Bridges, Looker with Albert Finney,
The Gang
that Couldn't Shoot Straight with Robert DeNiro, Soylent Green with Charlton Heston, and
The Horsemen with Omar Shariff.
Leigh has appeared in over one hundred
hours of television in such well known series as, Peyton Place, Dallas and
the CBS award winning Picket Fences, for which she won an Emmy. She has
starred in eight Movies of the Week.
In addition to her film and television
work, Leigh has a special passion for the theater. She had the unique
privilege of performing in one of Samuel Beckett's last works, The Beckett
Plays, directed by Alan Schneider at the Mark Taper Forum in Los Angeles.
She went on to appear with the company at the Harold Clurman Theatre in New
York, the Donmar Warehouse Theatre in Covent Garden, London, and the
Edinburgh Festival in Scotland. Leigh then traveled to Paris, at the request
of Beckett himself, to meet with him -- an honor she shares with a very
select group of fellow actors.
Leigh has worked for Ted Turner's Better
World Society. She is the voice of the Search for Serenity series of audio
meditations for The Course in Miracles. She has also produced and narrated a
series of creative visualization tapes in development with her own company.
She continues research in the area of health, fitness and alternative forms
of healing and consciousness. Leigh deeply believes that body, mind and
spirit are intertwined. This is revealed in her contagious enthusiasm for
life and her incisive, intellectual curiosity. She is an ordained minister
in the Movement of Spiritual Inner Awareness and works closely with John
Roger, an educator and Wayshower.
Born to a diplomatic family in
Washington, DC, Leigh began her formal education as an Economics major at
Northwestern University. She soon changed to Theater and studied under the
renowned teacher, Alvina Krause. In recognition of Leigh's exceptional
talent, Krause allowed her the opportunity to perform as the youngest member
of the distinguished Eaglesmere Summer Repertory Theatre. Leigh subsequently
continued her studies in New York City with Sanford Meisner, at the
Neighborhood Playhouse.
Leigh's varied pursuits have taken her
to many corners of the world. She has been active on behalf of the
environment as a Special Advisor in Arts and Media for the United Nations
Environment Programme (UNEP), as well as a representative for the Institute
for the Study of Individual and World Peace. In addition to her keynote
address for UNEP's 20th Anniversary, Leigh was the Goodwill Ambassador from
the United Nations for ICEBRIDGE: First Arctic Environmental Forum 1995.
Leigh Taylor-Young's communication
skills, dedication to service and pertinent issues, together with her life
experiences -- from classical ballet student, to 60's flower child and early
stardom, through motherhood and beyond -- are virtually unsurpassed in
diversity.
Leigh has one son, Patrick, a
sportscaster in Los Angeles, California. Leigh resides in Los Angeles.
