Raised in the U.S., Europe and Africa, Leslie brings a wealth of experience and a curiosity about everyone and everything to her work. She's lived in a small hamlet among the remote Hamar tribe of southern Ethiopia and modeled for Betsey Johnson in New York. She’s spent summers on a tiny island off the west coast of Sweden and many seasons in Paris’ 7th arrondissement. 

Leslie has worked extensively both in front of and behind the camera and has many film and television credits, including CURB YOUR ENTHUSIASM, VEEP, Deputy, House, Criminal Minds, WACO, The Kid and Kihachi Okamoto’s award-winning film, East Meets West. She has worked as assistant director and casting director, including The Mad Songs Of Fernanda Hussein, recipient of the Rosa Luxembourg award, she coaches actors preparing for film and television roles, consults producers re: production and incentives, and is currently co-producing a beautiful feature.

She filmed and directed two documentary shorts, Jai Guru Dev I and II, and savors her many summers teaching at the esteemed Film Workshops in Rockport, Maine, at Second City Comedy school in Hollywood and Screen Actors Guild Conservatory, L.A. as well as the New England Film Academy, Sonoma Academy,  University of Massachusetts, Boston, the Boston Film and Video Foundation, and the American School in Paris.

She co-founded the summer theatre festival Shakespeare In Santa Fe, Frogs On The Water Theatre Company, Something In The Air Dance Theatre and Nausikaa Productions in Paris. At the suggestion of Julia Cameron and Mark Bryan, creators of the Artist's Way workshops, she brought the Artist's Way to France and Italy in 1996 where it continues to support many artists and performers in their creative process. 

She has a B.A. in Performing Arts from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst and a graduate degree in film from the British-American Theatre Institute. 

In New York she modeled for designer Betsey Johnson and studied at the Alvin Ailey Dance Theatre. 

Her mission is to open hearts and minds and uplift consciousness (her own and anyone else’s!) through powerful stories that remind us we’re all in this together and that Love is the most powerful force in the world and probably in the universe.