Born in Los Angeles, Jennifer Jason Leigh - the daughter of actor Vic Morrow - worked in her first film at the age of nine, in a nonspeaking role for the film Death of a Stranger (Tod eines Fremden (1973)). At 14 she attended summer acting workshops given by Lee Strasberg and landed a role in the Disney TV movie The Young Runaways (1978) (TV), and received her Screen Actors Guild membership in an episode of the TV series "Baretta" (1975) when she was 16. Jennifer performed in several TV movies and dropped out of Pacific Palisades High School six weeks short of graduation for her major role in the film Eyes of a Stranger (1981). Her first major success came as the female lead in Fast Times at Ridgemont High (1982).