Jamie Lee Curtis fought back tears during an appearance on The Tonight Show as she spoke about the destructive fires currently burning in Los Angeles. Before discussing her new film The Last Showgirl with host Jimmy Fallon, Curtis acknowledged what was going on in her hometown.
“As you know, where I live is on fire right now,” the actress told the New York-based late-night show. “Literally, the entire city of the Pacific Palisades is burning. I flew here last night. I was on the plane and started getting texts. It’s fucking gnarly, you guys. It’s a catastrophe in Southern California. Obviously, there have been horrific fires in many places. This is literally where I live. Everything — the market I shop in, the schools my kids go to. Many, many, many, many friends now have lost their homes. It’s a really awful situation.”
She added, “I am obviously going to go home first thing tomorrow and be with my friend and try to help my friends.” She also encouraged viewers to support the American Red Cross, for which she is an ambassador, and to do whatever they can to help, from donating blood to donating money. “Do anything you can,” she said. “Anything in your community to help people.”
Curtis admitted that she was “terrified” to be on The Tonight Show because she’s scared of Fallon, but she was generally happy to be there despite the tragedy in LA. She also spoke about her experience making The Last Showgirl, which arrives in theaters this week, and what it was like to film a scene dancing to “Total Eclipse of the Heart.”
Although Curtis told Fallon she didn’t want to sing or do impressions on the late-night show, she did gamely recreate her iconic aerobics scene from her 1985 Perfect alongside the host.
Curtis has posted extensively about the fires on Instagram, sharing resources and encouraging the community to come together. This morning she tried to stay optimistic, writing, “This is the moment to reach out to anyone who lives in Los Angeles, who you think might be in some sort of traumatic shock and grief about losing their homes and the devastation of their neighborhoods and communities and offer your hand, home and resources. We are going to have to come together,as we may never have done before, in the City of Angels and help each other.”
