Holly Hunter (born March 20, 1958) is an American actress. Born in Conyers, Georgia, her first acting role was as Helen Keller in a fifth-grade play, before appearing in Rockdale County High School stagings of Oklahoma!, Man of La Mancha, and Fiddler on the Roof. In Pittsburgh, she graduated with a drama degree at Carnegie Mellon University and performed in local theater.
She then moved to New York City with Frances McDormand, beginning a Broadway career. After appearing in a slasher film released in 1981, The Burning, she moved to Los Angeles a year later, taking on various supporting roles in theatrical and television films before starring in Raising Arizona (1987) and receiving an Academy Award nomination for her starring role in Broadcast News (1987). She later went on to win two Primetime Emmy Awards for her performances in the television films Roe vs. Wade (1989) and The Positively True Adventures of the Alleged Texas Cheerleader-Murdering Mom (1993).
For her performance as a mute Scottish woman in The Piano (1993), she won the Academy Award for Best Actress. Later on, she was nominated for two more Oscars in The Firm (1993), and Thirteen (2003). Other major accolades she has won include an AACTA Award, a Silver Bear, a BAFTA Award, a Cannes Film Festival Award and a Golden Globe.
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Early life
Hunter was born in Conyers, Georgia to Marguerite "Dee Dee" (née Catledge), a homemaker, and Charles Edwin Hunter, a part-time sporting goods company representative and farmer with a 250-acre farm. She is the youngest of six children. Her parents encouraged her talent at an early age, and her first acting part was as Helen Keller in a fifth-grade play. She is unable to hear with her left ear due to a childhood case of the mumps. The condition sometimes leads to complications at work, and some movie scenes have to be altered from the script for her to use her right ear. She is irreligious. She began acting at Rockdale County High School in the early 1970s, performing in local productions of Oklahoma!, Man of La Mancha, and Fiddler on the Roof. Hunter earned a degree in drama from Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh and for a while performed in local theater, playing ingenue roles at City Theater, then named the City Players.
Career
Hunter moved to New York City and roomed with fellow actress Frances McDormand, living in the Bronx "at the end of the D (subway) train, just off 205th Street, on Bainbridge Avenue and Hull Avenue". A chance encounter with playwright Beth Henley, when the two were trapped alone in an elevator, led to Hunter's being cast in Henley's plays Crimes of the Heart (succeeding Mary Beth Hurt on Broadway), and Off-Broadway's The Miss Firecracker Contest. "It was like the beginning of 1982. It was on 49th Street between Broadway and Eighth [Avenue] ... on the south side of the street," Hunter recalled in an interview. "[We were trapped] 10 minutes; not long. We actually had a nice conversation. It was just the two of us."
Hunter made her film debut in the 1981 slasher movie The Burning. After moving to Los Angeles in 1982, Hunter appeared in TV movies before being cast in a supporting role in 1984's Swing Shift. That year, she had her first collaboration with the writing-directing-producing team of brothers Ethan Coen and Joel Coen, in Blood Simple, making an uncredited appearance as a voice on an answering-machine recording. More film and television work followed until 1987, when she earned a starring role in the Coens' Raising Arizona and was nominated for an Academy Award for her performance in Broadcast News, after which Hunter became a critically acclaimed star.
Hunter went on to the screen adaptation of Henley's Miss Firecracker; Steven Spielberg's Always, a romantic drama with Richard Dreyfuss; and the made-for-TV 1989 docudrama Roe vs. Wade about the Supreme Court case Roe v. Wade. Following her second collaboration with Dreyfuss, in Once Around, Hunter garnered critical attention for her work in two 1993 films, resulting in her being nominated for two Academy Awards the same year: Hunter's performance in The Firm won her a nomination as Best Supporting Actress, while her portrayal of a mute Scottish woman entangled in an adulterous affair with Harvey Keitel in Jane Campion's The Piano won her the Best Actress award. Hunter went on to star in the comedy-drama Home for the Holidays and the thriller Copycat, both in 1995. Hunter appeared in David Cronenberg's Crash and as a sardonic angel in A Life Less Ordinary. The following year, Hunter played a recently divorced New Yorker in Richard LaGravenese's Living Out Loud; starring alongside Danny DeVito, Queen Latifah, and Martin Donovan. Hunter rounded out the 1990s with a minor role in the independent drama Jesus' Son and as a housekeeper torn between a grieving widower and his son in Kiefer Sutherland's drama Woman Wanted. Following a supporting role in the Coens' O Brother, Where Art Thou?, Hunter took top billing in the same year's television movie Harlan County War, an account of labor struggles among Kentucky coal-mine workers. Hunter would continue her small screen streak with a role in When Billie Beat Bobby, playing tennis pro Billie Jean King in the fact-based story of King's exhibition match with Bobby Riggs; and as narrator of Eco Challenge New Zealand before returning to film work with a minor role in the 2002 drama Moonlight Mile. The following year found Hunter in the redemption drama Levity.
Personal life
Hunter was married to Janusz Kamiński, cinematographer of Schindler's List and Saving Private Ryan from 1995 until 2001.
She has been in a relationship with British actor Gordon MacDonald since 2001. The couple met in San Jose Repertory Theatre's production of playwright Marina Carr's By the Bog of Cats, in which she played a woman abandoned by her lover of 14 years, played by MacDonald. In January 2006, Hunter gave birth to the couple's twin sons.
Filmography
Awards and nominations
In 1999, Hunter received the Golden Plate Award of the American Academy of Achievement. In 2016, Hunter was awarded an Honorary Doctorate degree by her alma mater, Carnegie Mellon University.
