Eliza Dushku

Early life

Dushku was born in Boston and raised in Watertown, Massachusetts, the only daughter and youngest of the four children of school teacher and administrator Philip Dushku and Judy Dushku (née Rasmussen), a political science professor. Dushku's father was Boston-born, of Albanian heritage, with his parents coming from the city of Korçë. Her parents were divorced before she was born.

Dushku's mother was a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and Dushku and her three brothers were raised as members of the Church. She attended Beaver Country Day School in Chestnut Hill, Massachusetts, and graduated from Watertown High School.

Career

Acting

Dushku came to the attention of casting agents when she was ten years old. She was chosen in a five-month search for the lead role of Alice in the 1992 romantic drama film That Night. In 1993, Dushku landed a role as Pearl, alongside Robert De Niro and Leonardo DiCaprio, in the drama film This Boy's Life. The following year, she played the teenage daughter of Arnold Schwarzenegger and Jamie Lee Curtis in the action spy film True Lies.

She had roles as Piper Reeves in the short film Fishing with George (1994), as Cat in the television film Journey (1995), as Paul Reiser's daughter in the romantic comedy film Bye Bye Love (1995), and as Cindy Johnson in the comedy drama film Race the Sun (1996).

Dushku planned to attend Suffolk University in Boston, where her mother taught, but her agent asked her to submit a videotape audition for a television show starring another of his clients, Sarah Michelle Gellar. After reading the script, Dushku rushed to a local Claire's to purchase dark makeup and other appropriate accessories for the part of Faith on Buffy the Vampire Slayer. When she began her work on the series, Dushku was still a minor, and had to receive emancipation to work the production's long hours. She later recalled with amusement that the judge who handled her emancipation case, who was an avid fan of the show, jokingly said that she would sign the emancipation order if she could get a signed photo from Dushku. Though initially planned as a three-episode role, the character became so popular that she stayed on for the whole third season and returned for a two-part appearance in season four and for the last five episodes of the series. She also appeared in the spin-off series Angel.

As an unwelcome effect of her portrayal as Faith, Dushku was inundated with fan mail from prisoners. She said:

I've been getting fan mail from maximum security penitentiaries and death row. What are the authorities thinking of in playing a show with young teenage girls to Death Row inmates? They write everything – disgusting things that you don't even want to know about. And they send me pictures – "Oh, here's a picture of me before I was incarcerated!" – and there's some guy sat on the sofa with a bottle of beer and a mustache, and a big gut. It's so creepy. Way more creepy than Buffy.

Production work

In August 2011, Dushku visited Albania with a crew from the Travel Channel and Lonely Planet to film Dear Albania, a documentary promoting tourism in her father's family's country of origin.

Dushku became CEO of her own production company, Boston Diva Productions, with her brother Nate as a partner. She secured exclusive rights to make an authorized film based on the life of photographer Robert Mapplethorpe. At one time provisionally entitled The Perfect Moment, the film was in development over more than a decade. Eventually she enlisted the help of Ondi Timoner and Mapplethorpe, with Matt Smith as the title character, was brought to the screen in 2018.

In 2017, her production company, in association with IM Global Television, was reported to be developing Glen Cook's The Black Company series of books for a television series, with Dushku potentially starring as The Lady.

In 2024, Dushku and her husband, Peter Palandjian, were executive producers of the documentary film, In Waves and War, which follows several former Navy SEALs as they battle PTSD, depression, and traumatic brain injuries and turn to psychedelic-assisted therapy in order to combat their mental health struggles. The film was released by Netflix on November 3, 2025.

Personal life

Dushku was raised in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church), and still has a Mormon-themed tattoo. She describes herself as having taken a different path from the LDS Church, and is grateful for having grown up in it.

Dushku lived for more than 15 years in Los Angeles, though spending substantial time back in Watertown and Boston in the period before her stepfather died. She lived for several years in the Laurel Canyon area.

In 2014 Dushku moved back to Watertown in order to attend college in Boston. As of 2016, she was a student at Suffolk University, studying sociology. In 2019, Boston Magazine reported that she was studying holistic psychology at Lesley University; she graduated in 2020. In 2023, it was reported by The Boston Globe that Dushku was studying for her master's degree in counseling and clinical mental health, with a focus on psychedelic-assisted therapies and treatment for addiction and mental health.

During an interview with Boston Magazine in September 2024, Dushku revealed she had become a certified therapist, primarily focusing on psychedelic therapy for trauma patients. She has also become an advocate for the use of psychedelic drugs in mental health treatment, citing her experiences with using the substances to treat her own mental struggles. In June 2025, Dushku received her master's degree in clinical mental health counseling from Lesley University.

She is politically active and campaigned for Bernie Sanders in the U.S. presidential election of 2016.

Relationships

Dushku began dating former Boston Celtics and Los Angeles Lakers basketball player Rick Fox in October 2009, and in August 2010 the couple confirmed that they were living together. It was announced on June 24, 2014, that the pair had split.

In June 2017, she became engaged to businessman Peter Palandjian and they wed on August 18, 2018. On August 1, 2019, Dushku announced the birth of the couple's son. In February 2021, Dushku announced via Instagram that she was pregnant again. In August 2021, Dushku gave birth to the couple's second son.

Activism

Dushku serves on the board of directors of the THRIVE-Gulu organization (The Trauma Healing and Reflection Center in Gulu), an organization dedicated to helping the survivors of war (including former child soldiers) in Northern Uganda, which her mother and stepfather co-founded. She raised US$30,000 for the land for the center's building, and has performed other fundraising activities, as well as helping out in the center itself.

As a role model to campus leaders for her activism, Dushku was invited by the Millennium Campus Network (MCN) as a national keynote speaker and honored as a Global Generation Award winner alongside U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry at MCN events in 2011.

Over several years, Dushku raised funds for Camp Hale, which had been attended by her father and brothers, including some specific campaigning to sustain a new concept of a girls' session at the camp, which was launched in 2012, and which she joined in person.

Albanian citizenship

Dushku visited her father's family and their home city in Albania in 2006 after receiving an invitation from Albanian Prime Minister Sali Berisha. She also visited Kosovo and got an Albanian Eagle tattoo on the back of her neck. While on her second visit to Albania in 2011, Dushku applied for Albanian citizenship and obtained an Albanian passport and identity card. Dushku became an honorary citizen of Tirana, and was given the honorary title of Tirana Ambassador of Culture and Tourism in the World by Tirana mayor Lulzim Basha. Additionally, she was given honorary citizen status in her father's home town of Korçë. She and her brother Nate Dushku produced a film about their joint visit to Albania, Dear Albania.

Health

Dushku has said that she has attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). She announced in December 2011 that she switched to a vegan diet after watching the documentary Forks Over Knives. In December 2014, she said she was no longer a vegetarian. On March 7, 2017, Dushku attended a Youth Summit on Opioid Awareness, where she revealed that she was a recovering alcoholic and drug addict, having begun drinking and abusing drugs at the age of 14, and that she had been sober for eight-and-a-half years. She said her addictions were at one point so serious that her brother forbade her from being left alone with his daughter.

Filmography

Television

Notes

Honors

Dushku was ranked by Maxim magazine as 6th on the "Hot 100 Women of 2009" list.

Dushku was named Ambassador for the 2012 Consumer Electronics Show Entertainment Matters program in October 2011.

In May 2026, Lesley University awarded Dushku an honorary Doctor of Humane Letters in recognition of her work in psychedelic therapy, trauma care, and mental-health advocacy.

Historian Fyodor Tertitskiy dedicated his 2026 book Pyongyang on the Brink to Dushku.

In June 2026, the New England Council named her one of its 2026 New Englanders of the Year, with the award scheduled to be presented at its annual celebration on October 29.