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 marks nearly five decades in the industry with a candid look at where it all began.
The 67-year-old posted a side-by-side photo to Instagram on Monday, March 31, pairing with a photo of herself aged around 19 in one of her first TV roles, an unnamed waitress in a 1977 film. Columbo episode, alongside a recent selfie.
“Next year I will [have] I have been an actress for 50 years. I was never going to become an actor. I thought I would be a cop,” she wrote.
The thinking was generally well-founded.
Curtis said he told the story of those early uncredited roles on the set of his current project, a collaboration with Nicole Kidman for Prime Video. Scarpette.
“There was no future stumbling,” she wrote. “It was just every job, one job at a time, grateful for every opportunity and patience. Lots of fucking patience.”
Since his anonymous beginnings as a contract actor at Universal Pictures, Curtis has built one of Hollywood’s most enduring careers, including Real lies, Places of commerce, A fish called Wanda, Weird Friday And At loggerheadsamong 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 at the same time.
The post also touches on something Curtis has talked about before, his approach to working with younger actors.
During a recent appearance on Todayshe got emotional when co-host Sheinelle Jones brought up how she supported Lindsay Lohan during the filming of Weird Friday.
“Show business is nothing but a transaction,” Curtis said. “I try to be safe and be a home base” for child actors, she added, specifying that she expects nothing in return.
Lohan, who was just 15 when filming began, said PEOPLE in July 2025, Curtis “was really there for me privately” during a difficult time in his life.
