Melissa Leo's dad: She let feelings fly

Arnold Leo said his daughter Melissa picked up some salty language from the fishermen of the South Fork as a child, but he put the blame for a bleeped word during her Oscar acceptance speech Sunday night on something else entirely: pure emotion.

"In her excitement," said Arnold Leo, who lives in Springs, "she just let fly with the way she was feeling."

Network censors bleeped Leo as she noted that "it looked so - - easy" when she saw Kate Winslet accept her award at a previous show. Backstage, she apologized to anyone who was offended, adding that "There is a great deal of the English language that is in my vernacular."

Arnold Leo said he was "elated" and sprang out of his seat when his daughter's name was announced for best supporting actress at the Academy Awards, a sign that she finally reached the summit of her craft.

"After all these years to be recognized this way by her peers, by the academy, is just totally thrilling and wonderful," he said.

Leo, 50, won for her role as Alice Ward, mother of boxer Micky Ward, whose rise to a champion was chronicled in the "The Fighter."

Raised chiefly in Manhattan and Vermont, Leo spent most summers in the Hamptons with her father, now 75, secretary of the East Hampton Baymen's Association since 1978.