After years of living along the Pacific coast in Malibu, British actress Lesley-Anne Down named California’s continuous wildfires and liberal-leaning politics as the reasons she and her family left the Golden State for a life in Georgia.
Down lived in southern California for decades after crossing the pond to pursue her Hollywood dream, but became so let down by the environment there — both natural and political — that she would eventually become a Southern belle.
But Down, now 72, perhaps best known for her film roles in 1976’s "The Pink Panther Strikes Again" and 1978’s "The Great Train Robbery," traded it all in for a serene life feeding the deer that frequent her residence outside Atlanta in what she described as the ultimate "suburban countryside."
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The actress and singer — known as one of Hollywood’s most beautiful women in the late ‘70s and ‘80s for her piercing blue eyes and striking features — was voted Britain’s Most Beautiful Teenager and had her breakthrough role in the British television series "Upstairs, Downstairs."
"I have to be very honest. I cannot think of a more lovely place to have brought up our first lot of kids, you know, who are now all in their middle and late 40s," Down told Fox News Digital, reflecting on her time living in the Point Dume and Trancas areas of Malibu. "It was just lovely."
Down, along with her husband, cinematographer and director Don E. FauntLeRoy, spent a lot of time in Malibu in the early ‘80s before they purchased their first house together on Point Dume. They lived there until 2020.
"I remember looking out the kitchen window and, like, three riderless horses just going out for a little trot," she said, recalling the beauty of Broad Beach at that time, which she would later refer to as "Rock Beach" because of all the erosion. "But then it began to change — the people and, quite frankly, the fires. The fires got worse and worse."
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During the first 10 years of living there, Down recalled only one fire in which she was actually evacuated. But then, not more than two years later, another fire required all of her friends in Corral Canyon to vacate their homes.
"We had a house full of fire victims, quite frankly, because who wants to sleep on a cot in Malibu High School? And we had a big house, so that was that," Down recalled, noting that her husband was often away working when the fires occurred.
The Woolsey fire in 2018 was the last straw. Down remembered getting a police escort over Kanan Dume Road, which she said "looked like the moon" at that point.
"And I said, I can’t take this anymore," she recalled, crediting her young son George, a typical Malibu-raised surfer dude at the time, with saving their home.
Down and her husband had been talking for years about leaving the state but weren’t sure where to go. The growing frequency of California’s wildfires wasn’t the only factor; Down was also increasingly troubled by the state’s shift toward more liberal politics and policies.
Earlier in her career, Down had also experienced her share of brushes with the industry’s casting couch.
"We’re in this politically correct world, and you can only be one thing, and you can’t be anything else," Down said, noting that because of this "politically very, very frightening world" that we live in, the United States is rushing at light speed toward what her native Britain has become.
"That’s always what’s happened, you know. America always follows suit from England, sort of, you know, eight to 10 years later," she said, making it a point to endorse fellow Brit and California gubernatorial candidate Steve Hilton to become the state’s next governor.
"He’s such a smart man," she said.
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"Quite frankly, I don’t think I’ve ever made any secret of where I feel and where I land politically, even though I was not where I am politically when I was young, but I am now," Down said. "So, I think that the chances of me ever working — even if I wanted to — in this industry, because of my politics, are slim to none."
"God forbid, I was, you know, 35, and I wanted to work, and I needed to work. Guess what I’d have to do? I’d either have to be very brave and very poor, or I’d have to keep my trap shut and pretend that I’m something that I am not," she added.
But to every rule there is an exception, and for Down, that meant taking on the role of Margaret Thatcher in the 2024 biopic "Reagan," around the same time she, her husband and their son moved to the Atlanta area. It was a place that FauntLeRoy was familiar with due to work ties and where their son George, who wanted to work in the industry, could thrive.
For Down, the role in "Reagan" came out of the blue, and she described it as somewhat fortuitous because, as she put it, "COVID-19 left the pool of actresses smaller."
"In all honesty, in my entire life, I never really wanted to be in this industry. Life just happened. And then I was on a roller coaster and that is what happened to me," Down said, noting that she felt very much a part of the "old school" of Hollywood and never transitioned well to what she referred to as the "new school" of actors in town. And when she attempted that transition, she wasn't happy.
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"It was not professional as far as I could see," Down said, noting how radically the industry had changed. "When I did ‘Reagan,’ everything that I’m saying to you is not true. ‘Reagan’ was very much ‘old school.’ The people were old school, everybody behaved old school, the etiquette … the group you were with was really marvelous."
"And so, you know, honestly and truly, if I could do a film or a job like that every so often, I’d do it, but they’re rare," she continued. The movie is returning to approximately 600 theaters for a wide re-release on Sept. 25.
For now, Down continues to enjoy domesticity, her community of neighbors whom she calls "intensely wonderful," and the deer that visit her daily.
"There’s one stag, and he’s not scared at all, and I have to tell him — I say, ‘Could you please stay away from me while I put the corn on the ground?’" Down explained in her distinctly polished but whimsical British tone.
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While she’ll reminisce about those days in the Malibu sun, what Down — who grew up poor and had a father who instilled in her the belief that "nothing is free" — doesn’t miss are the fires or the politics.
She cites those "libbies" who can afford to say, "Everybody should have everything free," yet live in a society that needs the kind of money required to pay for all of those things.
It’s not even that she doesn’t take the left’s side on some things. She said it’s about how polarizing it has become to even talk about differing views.
"You can’t appear to be right-wing today, because if you appear to be on the right, or you have any right-wing political views whatsoever, they take that, and they twist it, and they use it to turn you, strangely enough, into some kind of Nazi, when really the reverse is true," Down explained.
"That’s a shame, I think. I was not happy with the fact that people couldn’t talk. I don’t like people screaming at me about nothing," she said. "So if you put the politics and the fires and the need for George to establish a life, that is the perfect storm and that’s why we’re here."