Téa Leoni (born February 25, 1966) is an American actress. She is perhaps best known for her roles in Jurassic Park III, The Family Man, Deep Impact, Fun with Dick and Jane, Spanglish and Bad Boys.

Early life

Leoni was born Elizabeth Téa Pantaleoni ( ) in New York City, the daughter of Emily (née Patterson), a dietician and nutritionist, and Anthony Pantaleoni, a corporate lawyer of the firm Fulbright & Jaworski. Leoni's mother is a native of Texas, and her father is of Italian and Polish descent. Leoni's paternal grandmother, Helen "Helenka" Tradusa Adamowska (1901 - 1987), was a film and stage actress who was a sister of Józef and Tymoteusz Adamowski, who with Józef's wife, Antonina Szumowska-Adamowska, were the Adamowski Trio. Leoni's paternal great-grandfather was the brother of Italian economist and politician Maffeo Pantaleoni.Lo Schiavo, LindAnn "Take Téa" LideaMagazine.com, "Giugino 2005"

Career

Leoni attended Brearley School and The Putney School. She attended but did not complete studies at Sarah Lawrence College. In 1988 she was cast as one of the four new angels in Angels 89, an updated version of the 1970s show, Charlie's Angels. In May 1988, Life magazine ran a story on the casting of this new series. After production delays, the show never aired. The following year, Leoni starred as "Lisa DiNapoli" in the TV series Santa Barbara.

She went on to appear in the film A League of Their Own (1992), and later that year starred with Corey Parker in the single-season Fox sitcom Flying Blind, playing a beautiful, eccentric, downtown-Manhattan libertine who falls in love with an ordinary Long Island college graduate. In February 1995, she played a guest role in an episode of the sitcom Frasier, playing the fiance of Sam Malone, portrayed by guest star Ted Danson, in a crossover from Cheers. That same year, Leoni landed the lead role in the sitcom The Naked Truth, playing Nora Wilde, a tabloid news journalist. The show ran through 1998.

Her films include Bad Boys (1995), Deep Impact, The Family Man, Jurassic Park III, Hollywood Ending, Spanglish, and Ghost Town.

Leoni ranked #79 on the FHM "100 Sexiest Women of 2000" list.

Personal life

Leoni states in the October 27, 2006, issue of Life magazine that she became a Goodwill Ambassador for UNICEF partially because her paternal grandmother was the president of the U.S. Fund for UNICEF for 25 years.

Leoni married her first husband, Neil Joseph Tardio, Jr., a television commercial producer, on June 8, 1991, at St. Luke's Episcopal Church in Hope, New Jersey. The couple divorced in 1995.