Jennifer Ward-Lealand

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Jennifer Cecily Ward-Lealand CNZM (born 8 November 1962) is a New Zealand actor and director whose screen credits includes the in 1993 movie Desperate Remedies as well as appearances in The Footstep Man, the soap Shortland Street and Australian comedy series Full Frontal.

Ward-Lealand was born in Wellington, New Zealand to Philippa "Pippa" Mary (née Ward) and Conrad Ainsley Lealand. She has an older sister, Diana Mary Ward-Pickering and a half brother Simcha Lindt.

She is married to actor Michael Hurst of Hercules: The Legendary Journeys fame. They have two sons, born in 1997, and 1999.

Her first ongoing television role was as Jan in Close to Home (1978–1980). After leaving school she spent a year touring New Zealand in a community theatre group, performing clown shows and Chekhov.

In 1982 Ward-Lealand completed a year-long diploma in acting from Auckland's then influential Theatre Corporate. In between the theatre work that followed, Ward-Lealand appeared in short-lived TV drama Seekers, before her breakthrough television role in "Danny and Raewyn", an episode from the About Face series. Filmed largely in an Auckland flat so cramped the cameraman sometimes had to sit on the stove, this tale of working class relationship breakdown would win Ward-Lealand a GOFTA Best Actress Award.