Linda Hunt

Linda Hunt was born in Morristown, New Jersey and raised in Westport, Connecticut, one of the two daughters of Raymond Davy Hunt, vice president of Harper Fuel Oil on Long Island and Elsie Doying Hunt, a piano teacher who taught at the Westport School of Music and accompanied the Saugatuck Congregational Church choir. Linda Hunt attended the prestigious Interlochen Arts Academy. She has a sister, Marcia.

Linda began her theatrical career more than 30 years ago at the Long Wharf Theatre in New Haven, Conn., playing roles in plays by Shakespeare, Strindberg, O’Neill and Tennessee Williams. In the 1980’s, she earned a Tony Award nomination for her work in Arthur Kopit’s "End of the World" and Obie Awards for roles in Caryl Churchill’s "Top Girls" and "A Metamorphosis in Miniature." 

Linda is perhaps best-known for her role as Billy Kwan in The Year of Living Dangerously, Peter Weir's film adaptation of the novel of the same name. For her role as the male Chinese-Australian photographer, Linda won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress in 1983, becoming the first person to win an Oscar for playing a character of the opposite sex (also the first to win playing an Australian character).

Also a well-known stage actress, Linda has received two Obie awards and a Tony Award nomination for her theatre work. She created the role of Aunt Dan in Wallace Shawn's play Aunt Dan and Lemon. Recently, she portrayed Sister Aloysius in the Pasadena Playhouse production of John Patrick Shanley's Tony Award-winning play Doubt. Her television appearances include recurring roles as Judge Zoey Hiller on David E. Kelley's series The Practice and as Dr. Claire Bryson on Without a Trace. She has narrated several installments of The American Experience on PBS. She now has a recurring role as a technical expert and supervisor on the CBS fall show NCIS: Los Angeles

Beside her acting abilities, Linda is distinguished by her small stature (she is 4'9"/1.45 m), and her rich, resonant voice, which she has used in numerous documentaries, cartoons, and commercials. She is the on-air host for City Arts & Lectures, a radio program recorded by KQED public radio. She was chosen by Walt Disney Feature Animation to lend her enigmatic speaking and singing voice to Grandmother Willow in the film Pocahontas.

Her voice work also includes the character of "Management" in Carnivàle, and the titan Gaia, who serves as the Narrator in the God of War series of video games. She narrated the introductory film at the International Spy Museum in Washington, D.C.

Linda has chosen a lesbian lifestyle and lives in Los Angeles with her "spouse" of 22 years, Karen, and their three canine kids.

Please pray this week for Linda, that God will miraculously reveal Himself to her and that she will find the grace and forgiveness we all need at the foot of the cross.