The actress is proud of her legacy!
Jamie Lee Curtis is a nepo baby, and proud of it!
The actress wasted no time poking fun at herself during the 2023 SAG Awards, as she received major applause during the traditional "I'm an actor" introductions that open the annual awards show.
Curtis told the crowd about getting her SAG card at 19 years old and being hired -- and quickly fired -- from a short-lived TV series called Operation Petticoat, which was based on a film of the same name that starred her father, Tony Curtis. Curtis' mother, Janet Leigh, was also an actress, best known for her performance in Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho.
"Nepo baby!" she exclaimed, to big laughs from the crowd.
However, getting fired from Operation Petticoat, Curtis pointed out, freed her up to appear in a "little no-budget horror film" that ended up kicking off the Halloween franchise.
She also addressed the nepo baby label when she won for Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Supporting Role, when she mentioned her famous parents, but explained how hard she'd worked to get to this moment and reveled in the triumph.
Speaking with ET's Denny Directo backstage after her big win, Curtis addressed her comments, sharing, "I joke about it because it's the thing that people like to joke about. But the truth of the matter is, I've been doing this for a very long time and I've never worked for anybody I ever knew. I mean, no one. I've only worked with strangers."
"The truth of the matter is, obviously it was a help. Obviously I know a lot about show off business," she added. "I'm not gonna pretend that there was no effect of having them as my parents. But I'm 64 years old, I've been an actress since I was 19."
Before the big show, ET caught up with Curtis on the SAG Awards red carpet, who said she was loving the awards season appreciation for Everything Everywhere All At Once, which landed the actress her first career Oscar nomination this year.
"This is Entertainment. This is the season of shiny things. It's beautiful attention. It's art. It's getting to see fabulous people in fancy dresses," Curtis shared. "But we're all real people, and we live in a world that is at war. And it's a very tough life out there for most people, and they look at show business -- or when I call show-off business -- as a distraction."
"It's entertainment, and if we're not having a good time doing it, if we look super serious, there's a problem," she added. "Because then the people watching us aren't having fun because we're not having fun. So guess what? We're having fun."
The 2023 SAG Awards will take place on Sunday, Feb. 26 at Fairmont Century Plaza in Los Angeles. The ceremony will stream live on Netflix's YouTube channel. See the full list of winners here and stay tuned to ETonline.com for complete SAG Awards coverage.
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