BEVERLY HILLS, Calif.
We're cooling our jets at the hotel bar, awaiting the arrival of Tea Leoni, who is upstairs taking her clothes off.
That's what the publicist says. Tea is changing. It'll just be a few more minutes. We drum our fingers, order a glass of sauvignon blanc, flip through the notes.
"I can't rest my laurels on a face or a body," Tea Leoni says, "or be the girl who shows up at fashion shows and premieres. I've never been that."
(Gerard Burkhart For The Washington Post)
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Tea Leoni was born Elizabeth Tea Pantaleoni in 1966. Sounds Italian. So, actually, she could have called herself Betty T. Pants.
Raised New York City. Daughter of a mergers and acquisitions lawyer. Park Avenue. Nice. Sarah Lawrence College. Natch. Majored in anthropology. No heavy lifting there. Dropped out; bummed around the Virgin Islands. First big break: winning an audition for a remake of the "Charlie's Angels" television series, which never got made.
Her hobbies include golf.
We're deep into reading about her 7-iron (Golf for Women magazine) when Tea (pronounced TAY-uh) Leoni appears in the flesh, wrapped in a short overcoat with an oversize silk flower in the lapel, lugging a handbag, blowing her blond hair off her face.
Even a little frazzled after a day being interviewed by the Hollywood foreign press corps, the woman glows like warm butter, as if lit by some incredibly high-end designer light bulb.
Hard day at the office?
"Don't start with me, buster," Leoni says.
She is kind of snappy, in that 1940s Hollywood way, a blond siren, but she'll also smoke the occasional cigar, knock back a tequila. She swears like a sailor. She is known to belch.
She flops down in the chair, scans the table, then a wave to the hovering waiter. "We're having wine? Great idea. I'll have whatever he's having."
We begin to utter our opening inanities. "Shhhh, shhhh, shhhh." Leoni is wagging a finger. "Just a minute." Grab. Flip. Pound. She cradles the mini-cell to her ear. Very nice ears. "Gotta check in with the family first." That would be husband David Duchovny, formerly of "The X-Files," and the two kids, daughter West, son Miller. A moment of personal phone talk. Some more button punching. Voice mail. Then: "Okay, shoot."
Leoni is starring in writer-director James L. Brooks's new domestic comedy-drama, "Spanglish." What is the movie about? Whew! Marriage. Kids. Longing. It is about the travails of a stunning and headstrong young Mexican maid and mother (the Spanish actress Paz Vega as Flor) and her bright-as-a-new-penny daughter, who enter the lives of a wealthy Westside Los Angeles family, the dysfunctional Claskys, led by Adam Sandler (playing it straight) as the sweet, decent, moral hub-dad who is a renowned chef, and his on-screen wife, Leoni, who is a train wreck.
