Linda Hunt
She won an Oscar playing a man, Billy Kwan, 25 years ago in The Year of Living Dangerously. I need to see that film again; I remember next to nothing about it. I do remember, however, a quite public story about how she fell into bouts of depression as a result of some combination of inability to get more parts, mostly due to her unusual size and look, but also tied in some way to some sort of gender confusion resulting from having been so highly regarded in a role so convincingly playing the other gender. She is generally highly regarded as an actress, although she was never going to get cast as the standard leading lady, and as a result, most of her parts were minor.
Ten best roles
10) Popeye 9) Eleni 8) Yours Mine and Ours 7) She-Devil 6) Dune 5) Kindergarten Cop 4) The Relic 3) If Looks Could Kill 2) Twenty Bucks 1) The Year of Living Dangerously
Percentile rating
71.66
May 27th, 2008 at 11:06 am
And, her acceptance speech for that Academy Award is one of the best ones I have ever heard (perhaps second only to Jodie Foster’s for The Accused). 25 years ago and I still remember it!