![]() ![]() They defaulted to their original choice for the role, hot young sitcom star Michael J. In 1985, Thompson was paired with Stoltz again in a Robert Zemeckis-helmed time-traveling adventure, but weeks into production, Zemeckis decided Stoltz did not fit the comedic lead part of rambunctious loser Marty McFly. Thomas Howell and Patrick Swayze's fellow Coloradoan teen freedom-fighter in the reactionary Cold War fantasy and cult classic, "Red Dawn," followed by the unattainable dream girl alongside Eric Stoltz and Chris Penn in the teensploitation flick, "The Wild Life" (1984). In 1983, she won the role of up-and-comer Tom Cruise's faithful musician girlfriend in the high school football-themed film, "All the Right Moves," which memorably featured a flash of Cruise's frontal nudity during a Thompson/Cruise sex scene. Though the film tanked, her sparkling all-American countenance put her much-in-demand for similar roles in a slate of films showcasing a new generation of Hollywood youth. Thompson caught more than viewers' eyes in the film, beginning a relationship with co-star Dennis Quaid. Initially waitressing to make ends meet, she wound up gaining a national audience in ads, most notably for Burger King and Twix candy bars.In 1982, Thompson won her first role in a proto-"video game" - actually a sort of interactive movie - called "Murder, Anyone?" and a year later, won her first feature film with the sequel "Jaws 3-D" (1983), in which she played a Sea World waterskiing performer terrorized by yet another giant shark. Thompson moved to New York, nevertheless, intent on pursuing the performing arts by other means. But at 19, Thompson found her aspirations dashed when legendary dancer and the American Ballet Theatre's artistic director Mikhail Baryshnikov rejected her from membership in the company, telling her that her body type was wrong for the art form. She graduated from Minneapolis's Marshall-University High School at 16 to dance professionally and went on to perform with the Minnesota Dance Theatre and the Pennsylvania Ballet Company. By age 14, she was drawing the attention of the professional dance community, earning scholarships from two of the top ballets in the U.S.: New York's American Ballet Theatre and the San Francisco Ballet. ![]() ![]() She soon remarried, to musician Rob Hanson, and Lea and two other siblings followed in her artistic footsteps, Thompson and brother Andrew gravitated towards dance, with the former beginning ballet classes when she was nine. Barbara, though struggling with alcohol abuse, supported the family by playing piano and singing in local clubs. The Thompsons moved to Minneapolis but divorced when Lea was six. Lea Katherine Thompson was born, in Rochester, MN, to Barbara and Cliff Thompson, the fifth child of an already struggling family who, for the first year of her life, lived in a local motel. ![]()
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