Bio
Joshua Leonard is an American actor and filmmaker who first garnered attention with his role in 1999's groundbreaking film The Blair Witch Project.
As an actor, Leonard has continued to work on projects that push the envelope, including 2009's Independent Spirit Award-winning Humpday, HBO's Hung and Showtime's United States of Tara. He also had a role on True Detective, starring Matthew McConaughey and Woody Harrelson.
Leonard was seen in the 2012 film The Motel Life - the directorial debut of the Polsky brothers - where he plays a gambling-addicted friend to the Flannigan brothers (Emile Hirsch and Stephen Dorff) who ends up saving one of their lives after a tragic train accident.
He co-starred opposite Jim Parsons and Harold Perrineau in Sunset Stories, had a supporting role in Leah Meyerhoff's Unicorns, was seen in Clutter and had a role in The Town that Dreaded Sundown.
Leonard appeared in Higher Ground, starring and directed by Vera Farmiga. He also reteamed twice with his Humpday collaborators with supporting roles in The Freebie and Treatment.
In 2016 he had a starring role as Max Elliot, Alex's gay ex-husband, in the short-lived medical drama series Heartbeat.
Not limiting his career to being in front of the camera, Leonard adapted, directed and starred in The Lie, a devilish morality tale adapted from a short story by acclaimed author T.C. Boyle. The project premiered at the 2011 Sundance Film Festival.
Leonard screened his directorial debut at Sundance in 2005 with The Youth in Us, a moving short that starred indie faves Lukas Haas and Kelli Garner. His next effort, Beautiful Losers - a documentary about a group of internationally renowned underground artists - won the Grand Jury prize at Cinevegas before its release in 2008.
Leonard has also directed music videos for popular acts such as Morcheeba, Harper Simon, Black Rebel Motorcycle Club and Fitz and the Tantrums. In 2009, his original screenplay, Spectacular Regret, was one of eight scripts selected to participate in the prestigious Film Independent/IFP director's lab.
Leonard began his career working with documentarians and experimental filmmakers at Mystic Fire Video, where he worked on films with subjects ranging from famed beat poet Allen Ginsberg to the Dalai Lama and comparative mythologist Joseph Campbell.