Meeting your significant other through work is a pretty common
scenario. Back to the Future star Lea Thompson’s personal life, however,
has a bit of a twist. She came very close to not working with her future husband, director
Howard Deutch , on the 1987 cult favorite, Some Kind of Wonderful. In today’s video,
we’re looking back at their life, their love, and the hardships Lea faced as a mother in Hollywood.
Lea Thompson grew up in a big family with two brothers and two sisters.
Always dreaming of becoming a ballerina and being a skilled dancer, she got a
scholarship at the American Ballet Theater. Sadly, her dancing dreams never came true.
Once, her teacher told her: “You’re a lovely dancer, but you’re too stocky.”
Ahh, harsh! And just like that, Lea decided to quit her dancing career and become an actor.
At the very beginning, she had some parts in various commercials and movies,
including Red Dawn and The Wild Life. In 1984, she was cast to play iconic Lorraine
Baines-McFly in the legendary franchise, Back To The Future, and got her breakthrough.
Howard Deutch started his career with music videos. He was born to music executive Murray
Deutch, best known for propelling Jane Morgan, Harry Belafonte , and Buddy Holly to stardom.
With the influence and skills Murray had, it was only fitting that he passed down some
of his creative genes to Howard, who has, in turn, applied it in his decades-long career.
He worked with a number of artists, including Billy Joel and Billy Idol. Soon,
he became one of the industry’s most respected commercial directors.
Deutch made his big-screen directing debut in 1986 with the movie Pretty in
Pink starring up-and-coming actors like Molly Ringwald James Spader,
Andrew McCarthy, and John Cryer . The movie was a huge success. Even
36 years later, it’s believed to have been a defining point for teen romantic comedy-drama.
It was also a precursor to the film that would change the director’s life forever.
In 1987, he directed another coming-of-age romance-drama,
Some Kind of Wonderful, starring Mary Stuart Masterson, Eric Stolz , and… Lea Thompson.
Although this film wasn’t an immediate success like Pretty In Pink, it’s since become a cult
favorite. For the prolific director, though, it was much more than that.
Though Howard cast Thompson in the film because of her acting skills, his crush on her might have
also influenced his decision. “Of course, how sexy Lea is was part of why I wanted her in the
movie,” he continued. “I had a crush on her that all of my friends teased me about. But there’s
also something grounded and relatable about her on screen,” Howard said in an interview with Salon.
Thompson’s casting changed the course of the beloved ’80s classic, he revealed.
Deutch would later describe it as one of the best decisions he ever made.
According to him, Lea had a lot to do with how the movie turned out.
“She had a lot to do, as far as I’m concerned, with the tone changing of
that movie as well as some of the other casting.” Here comes a twist! Lea Thompson almost wasn’t
in the iconic ’80s teen romance. As Deutch later explained in a bonus feature included
in a Blu-ray set of John Hughes films, she initially turned down working on the film.
It took a box office bomb for the actor to join the project. Howard revealed that
she finally accepted his offer because of another Howard — 1986’s Howard the Duck.
He explained that she decided to star in the movie following the lackluster reception of her previous
feature, which was panned by critics and only holds a 14 percent rating on Rotten Tomatoes.
Thompson has spoken about the flop to The Hollywood Reporter in 2016, saying,
“It was painful. I had to get on another movie. I wouldn’t have done Some Kind of
Wonderful if Howard wasn’t such a bomb.” While the abysmal premiere of Howard the
Duck seemed catastrophic at the time, things worked out for the best. Aside
from meeting her husband, Lea also starred in a movie that would go on to become a classic.
“Things that seemed bad had turned out to be good in the end,” she said.
The Back to the Future actor spoke about the making of the film to the AV Club in 2012,
saying that it affected her life a lot. “The opening of Some Kind of Wonderful is
just so exquisite. The way my husband put together that whole montage that sets up
the whole story, it’s just so beautifully done.” She added, “I’m amazed at how many people love it.
I’m also amazed at how many men really like it.” Despite Howard’s crush, the pair did not begin a
relationship during the film’s production. At the time, Lea was engaged to one
of her former co-stars, Dennis Quaid . “I was still with him, so I kind of had
to get out of that before. … But it was a crazy time.” Their five-year relationship
lasted from 1982 until 1987, starting when Thompson was 21 and Quaid was 28.
When the engagement ended, she began dating Howard, 11 years her senior,
whom she found to be an “exotic, complicated” man. By 1989, Lea and Howard were inseparable. In the
summer of that year, the couple tied the knot and have since enjoyed a blissful marriage.
Soon after the nuptials, the celebrity couple started a family. They welcomed
their first daughter Madelyn in 1991, with their second, Zoey coming three years later in 1994.
In 2019, Thompson spoke about how motherhood changed her career when she appeared on Justin
Long’s Life Is Short podcast. “I did 900 movies in a row,
but what happens is it all screeches to a halt when you have a baby,” Thompson said.
After Justin asked if that was a scientific fact, the actor said that they should do the
research. Lea added that Meryl Streep was the only actor she could think of that remained a
successful movie star after giving birth. “You can adopt a baby,” she said before
listing Charlize Theron and Sandra Bullock as actors that have continued
successful film careers after adopting children. “Once you actually create a placenta, you can’t be
a movie star anymore,” Thompson continued. “Does your face change that much? Or what happens?”
The actor claimed that she never had a starring role in a movie after giving
birth to her daughters. “I did The Beverly Hillbillies,” Thompson revealed. “After
that I have never done a big feature.” She added that “luckily there’s TV,”
where she found success as the titular character on Caroline in the City from
1995-1999, which was directed by her husband. Long then asked if Thompson enjoyed balancing
life as a mother with starring on the Caroline. Though she was grateful for the opportunity,
Lea acknowledged the challenges that come with being a part of a television series.
“I found sitcoms to be very, very traumatically hard,” she said about filming in front of a live
audience. “Not so much so as some other actresses I’ve heard of that threw up every time. Just the
process of doing a live play every week with the pressure of telling the jokes like boom-boom-boom
and not being able to screw up, ’cause if you screw up, they get really mad at you.”
Lea went on to perform on Broadway and star in Hallmark movies and the Freeform show,
Switched at Birth. At the same time, Howard’s directorial credits include TV shows like Melrose
Place, Ringer, CSI: NY, American Horror Story, Jane the Virgin, and Young Sheldon.
And clearly, it’s a family affair. Their daughters followed in their footsteps, with Madelyn writing,
directing, acting and making music, and Zoey starring in The Politician,
Dirty Grandpa, Zombieland: Double Tap, The Outfit, and the upcoming movie, Not Okay.
The whole family even collaborated on a film! Madelyn wrote The Year Of Spectacular Men,
her mother directed it, her father produced, and both she and her sister starred in it.
“Lea has always been the artist in this family,” Howard said. “Our kids got that
from her. Just as she did from her parents and how they valued creativity and her gift.”
On her daughters following in her footsteps, Lea told Parade,
“I think that in a lot of ways we just feel as if they’re going into the family business,
and that is lovely. It’s kind of sickening sometimes at the dinner
table because all we talk about is work, but I have a wonderful, collaborative
relationship with both of my daughters.” Being together for more than three decades,
Lea Thompson and Howard Deutch seem to be as happy as when they met. With 2 kids and
a number of projects together, they’re still going strong and have that sparkle between them.
That’s all we have for you today, Juicers! As always,
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