Melissa Leo, an award-winning actress who won the Best Supporting Actress Oscar in 2011 for her powerful performance as the controlling mother Alice Ward in David O. Russell’s boxing biopic The Fighter, has made a shocking admission about the award’s downside. In a recent Q&A that was published in a lot of entertainment news, the 65-year-old star said that winning the award has “not been good” for her work or personal life. She said that she had a “much better career” before winning.
Leo talked about the strange night at the 83rd Academy Awards when Kirk Douglas gave her the statuette in front of a crowd of stars, including her co-stars Mark Wahlberg, Christian Bale, and Amy Adams. She was more excited to meet the famous Douglas than to win, and she accidentally swore on live TV—thankfully, the broadcast was delayed—before completely losing her cool: “One loses one’s mind.” The movie, which was a hit boxing drama about real-life brothers Micky Ward and Dicky Eklund, also won Bale an Oscar for Best Supporting Actor.
Before The Fighter, Leo was nominated for an Oscar for Best Actress for Frozen River (2008) and got a lot of praise for her roles in 21 Grams and TV’s Homicide: Life on the Street. After she won, offers changed to “older, unpleasant women,” which limited her options even though she had won Emmys for her guest role on Louie in 2013 and had roles in Snowden, The Equalizer, and I Know This Much Is True. She says that Russell pushed her to get the part of Alice in Fighter and that she used her own grandmother’s background to play the tough, socioeconomic-driven character.
