A beautiful thespian of Polish, Italian, and English ancestry with remarkable acting talent, which is clearly visible to the eye of audience, Tea Leoni certainly has become a notable figure to look at, particularly when she jumps to the comedy genre. Born as Elizabeth Tea Pantaleoni into a proper family of corporate lawyer and professional nutritionist on February 25, 1966, in New York, Tea originally had developed a fondness for acting at her early age, largely due to the influence of her paternal grandmother, Helenka Adamowska, who used to be a silent film actress. However, the girl wisely preferred to concentrate on her study instead, attending Brearley High which located on Upper East Side of the city, then Putney High School in Vermont before entering Sarah Lawrence College in Yonkers to take majors in Anthropology and Psychology. It was not until this daughter of Anthony and Emily Pantaleoni returned from her journey around Italy, Japan, also the Isle of St. Croix during her college break that she really began to develop a career in acting.

Taking her friend's challenge to enter a local casting call in Boston for a newly-conceived TV series entitled "Angels '88", Tea surprisingly was given a major part despite her little knowledge and experience in performing characters. Realized this flaw, she thus started to polish her acting skills in Los Angeles while waiting for the realization of the "Charlie's Angels" spin-off which, much to her dismal, was never brought to the surface because of a writer's strike in Hollywood. Fortunately, this blue-eyed beauty then managed to earn a temporary replacement role of Lisa DiNapoli in NBC's soap opera "Santa Barbara" (1984-1993) in 1989, followed by her big screen debut through Blake Edwards' comedy flick entitled "Switch" (1991). Also took part in other projects of the same genre, such as "A League of Their Own" (1992), "Flying Blind" (1992), and "The Counterfeit Contessa" (1994), she satisfyingly gained more public attention when joined Will Smith along with Martin Lawrence in Michael Bay's smash box-office hit, "Bad Boys" (1995).

Noticed Tea's potentiality and excellent comedic skills, ABC immediately offered her to play the female lead in its new sitcom, "Wilde Again", which centered on the life of Nora Wilde, a formerly rich divorcee forced to become a tabloid newspaper photographer. Aired through the network in 1995 and later was broadcast by NBC in 1996 under the name "The Naked Truth", the show delightfully brought her to experience the first taste of popularity as she received huge accolades from both critics and audience, making her one of the conspicuous rising stars in Hollywood at that time. During the series' run up to the year 1998, this mesmerizing actress eagerly joined Ben Stiller and Patricia Arquette to film "Flirting With Disaster" (1996) while also began dating "The X-Files" actor, David Duchovny, leading her to obtain a lot of media publication.

Regardless of her failed relationships in the past with director Neil Tardio and Naked Truth's creator, Chris Thompson, Tea, without any single doubt, married Duchovny at Manhattan's Grace Church on May 6, 1997. In the meantime, she kept developing her acting career, this time through Mimi Leder's sci-fi drama, "Deep Impact" (1998), in which she took the risk to portray a serious enactment of a TV reporter named Jenny Lerner who finds out that Earth is about to be destroyed by a huge meteor. Successfully proved her diverse talent in performing different characters, she helped the movie to become one of the highest grossing pictures in that year for it successfully garnered more than 394 million U.S. dollar around the globe. This attainment unquestionably heightened her status in Hollywood film industry, but Tea simply chose to withdraw from the spotlight to nurture her daughter, Madelaine West whom she delivered on April 24, 1999.

However, the acting desire within her was hard to be resisted indeed, so she made her comeback in late 2000 with a female leading role in Brett Ratner's fantasy drama feature, "The Family Man" which was also starred by Nicolas Cage, Don Cheadle, and Jeremy Piven. Next, she was cast alongside Sam Neill, William H. Macy, plus Laura Dern in action thriller hit of "Jurassic Park III" (2001) while acted opposite acclaimed actor/director Woody Allen in his dramatic comedy work entitled "Hollywood Ending" (2002). After teamed up with Al Pacino also Kim Basinger in well-reviewed "People I Know" (2002), Tea once again went back to motherhood as she welcomed her son, Kyd Miller, on June 15, 2002. The two-year hiatus apparently did not fade her comical knack for she brilliantly displayed an enjoyable performance opposite Adam Sandler in "Spanglish" (2004) besides involved in her husband's project of "House of D" (2004) and "Fun with Dick and Jane" (2005).

Following this comeback, more acting roles delightfully came on Tea's way for her to enact throughout the rest of 2000s like those in "You Kill Me" (2007), "Ghost Town" (2008), "Funlady" (2009), and "Miss Captivity" (2010). In the meantime, she eagerly teamed up with Duchovny to produce a drama feature titled "American Dreamers", a big screen adaptation of the former Reader's Digest editor Peter Canning book set for a 2009 release.