Lea Thompson (born 31 May 1961; age 63) is an actress and director who directed the Star Trek: Picard second season episodes "Assimilation" and "Watcher". She also played Diane Werner in the episode "Fly Me to the Moon".
Alongside Andrew Robinson, Larry Dobkin, Richard Compton, Rainn Wilson, and Leslie Hope, she is one of the six non-series regulars who both acted and directed on Star Trek.
She has appeared as a guest on The Ready Room episode "Watcher".
Career[]
Thompson began her career as an actress, making her motion picture debut in Jaws 3-D (1983, co-starring Simon MacCorkindale and John Putch), before landing one of her most notable roles as Lorraine Baines McFly in Back to the Future (1985, co-starring Christopher Lloyd and Thomas F. Wilson, with Ivy Bethune, Jeff O'Haco, and Sachi Parker), a role she reprised in the film's two sequels, Back to the Future Part II (1989, co-starring Christopher Lloyd and Thomas F. Wilson) and Back to the Future Part III (1990, co-starring Christopher Lloyd and Thomas F. Wilson, with Byron Berline).
Her other prominent movie roles include SpaceCamp (1986, with Tate Donovan, Terry O'Quinn, and the voice of Frank Welker), Howard the Duck (1986, with Paul Guilfoyle, Paul Comi, James Lashly, David Paymer, John Fleck, and the voice of Richard Kiley), Dennis the Menace (1993, with Christopher Lloyd, Paul Winfield, and Bill Erwin), The Beverly Hillbillies (1993, co-starring Diedrich Bader), and The Little Rascals (1994, with Whoopi Goldberg).
From the mid-1990s, Thompson mostly switched to television. Between 1995 and 1999, she starred in Caroline in the City, and in 2002-03, she co-starred in For the People (which featured Armin Shimerman and Tamlyn Tomita in guest roles). Between 2005 and 2008, she played the titular character in nine Hallmark Channel Jane Doe mystery movies. From 2011 to 2017, she co-starred in Switched at Birth.
Starting in 2006, Thompson began to direct for television, directing episodes of shows like Switched at Birth, Mom (which featured occasional guest appearances by Rainn Wilson) and Young Sheldon (co-starring Wallace Shawn, Jason Alexander, and Ed Begley, Jr.). She has also directed episodes of Resident Alien (executive produced by Robert Duncan McNeill).