Lea Katherine Thompson

Thompson was born in Rochester, Minnesota on May 31st, 1961. She is one of five children of Clifford Thompson and Barbara Barry Thompson and Barbara Barry Thompson. Thompson has two older sisters, Coleen Goodrich (and Shannon Katona) and two younger brothers, Barry and Andrew. Her mother is of Irish descent.She trained in ballet when she was a child and began dancing professionally by 14 when she was awarded scholarship opportunities to the San Francisco Ballet, the Pennsylvania Ballet, and the American Ballet Theatre.When she turned 20 older and was dancing professionally with the American Ballet Theatre's Studio Company (then known as ABT II), the moment came to determine if she should join the main company. Mikhail Baryshnikov (the director of the artistic department at the time) informed her she was an excellent dancer, but that she was too big. According to her, it was "my epiphany when I decided to quit dancing and not become a ballet dancer. It was a wonderful moment because I could've been banging my head on the wall for 10 years. "[She changed to acting. She relocated to New York at the age of 20 and performed in several Burger King commercials in the 1980s, along with Sarah Michelle Gellar. Her co-star in Back to the Future Part II was Elisabeth Shue. and made her film debut in 1983, with Jaws 3-D. She described the film as "the first movie I've ever seen, however I lied and said I had done a couple of other movies, so when I showed up, I knew almost nothing about. I claimed I knew how water ski. But I didn't. I had to learn water-skiing techniques that were really difficult in five days as I needed to participate in the Sea World water skiing show. I don't even know how to swim!" The song was followed with All the Right Moves (1983), The Red Dawn(84) and along with The Wild Life (1984).