Jamie Lee Curtis has shared that acting was never part of her plan and that she once thought she would end up as a police officer, as she commemorates almost five decades in the industry with a candid look at where it all began.
The 67-year-old posted a side-by-side to Instagram on Monday, March 31, combining a photograph of herself around 19 years old in one of her first television roles, an unnamed waitress in a 1977. Colombo episode, along with a recent selfie.
“Next year I will do it [have] She has been an actress for 50 years. I was never going to be an actor. “I thought I would be a police officer,” he wrote.
Generally, the reflection was well-founded.
Curtis described how he told the story of those early uncredited roles on the set of his current project, a collaboration with Nicole Kidman for Prime Video. Scarpetta.
“There was no stumble in the future,” he wrote. “It was just every job, one job at a time, grateful for any opportunity and patience. A lot of fucking patience.”
Since those anonymous beginnings as a contract actor at Universal Pictures, Curtis has built one of Hollywood’s most enduring careers, taking on true lies, Commercial places, A fish named Wanda, strange friday and Knives outamong many others.
The daughter of actors Janet Leigh and Tony Curtis, she won the 2023 Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for her role as IRS auditor Deirdre Beaubeirdre in Everything everywhere and at the same time.
The post also touched on something Curtis has talked about before: his approach to working with younger actors.
During a recent appearance on Todaybecame emotional when co-host Sheinelle Jones brought up the topic of how she had supported Lindsay Lohan during the making of strange friday.
“Show business is nothing but transactions,” Curtis said. “I try to be safe and be a base of operations” for child actors, she added, making it clear that she expects nothing in return.
Lohan, who was just 15 when filming began, said PEOPLE in July 2025 that Curtis “was really there for me privately” during a difficult period in his life.
