Illeana Hesselberg, most commonly known as Illeana Douglas, (born July 25, 1965) is an American actress, director, screenwriter, and producer. Douglas has had a long-ranging diverse career as a character actor with a specialty in comedy. Notable works include work in a 2001 episode of Six Feet Under – for which she received a Primetime Emmy nomination as Outstanding Guest Actress in a Drama Series and won the Best Guest Actress in a Drama Series award from OFTA, the Online Film & Television Association – and her work in the TV series Action opposite Jay Mohr – for which she won a Satellite Award for Best Actress – Television Series Musical or Comedy. She can currently be seen on Turner Classic Movies where she hosts specials focused on unheralded women directors from film history.
Douglas was born in Quincy, Massachusetts, the daughter of Joan Douglas (née Georgescu), a schoolteacher, and Gregory Douglas, a painter. Douglas' father was the son of Hollywood actor Melvyn Douglas and his wife, the artist Rosalind Hightower. Douglas had two older brothers, the late Stefan Gregor Hesselberg, a technician in the histology laboratory at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology who also trained racehorses in Verona, Italy, and Erik Hesselberg, a journalist.