William Hurt

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William Hurt

Signing autographs at the 2005 Toronto Film Festival
Born March 20, 1950
Washington, D.C
Academy Awards
Won:
1985: Best Actor
in Kiss of the Spider Woman
Nominated:
1986: Best Actor in Children of a Lesser God
1987: Best Actor in Broadcast News
2005: Best Supporting Actor in A History Of Violence

William Hurt (born March 20, 1950) is an Academy Award-winning American actor.

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Born in Washington, D.C., Hurt is the stepson of Henry Luce III (the son of the founder of Time Magazine). Hurt graduated from Middlesex School in 1968 where he was the Vice President of the Dramatics Club and had the lead role in several of the school plays. His high school yearbook predicted, "With characteristics such as these, you might even see him on Broadway." Hurt attended Tufts University and studied theology, but turned instead to acting and joined the Juilliard Drama School studying alongside Christopher Reeve.

Hurt appeared first on stage, only later turning to film. His first major role was in the sci-fi hit Altered States (1980) which gave him wide recognition for playing an emotionally obsessed scientist. He received the Academy Award for Best Actor for Kiss of the Spider Woman in 1985. He received three additional nominations, one for Children of a Lesser God (1986), one for Broadcast News (1987) and one for A History Of Violence (2005).

Often cast as an intellectual, Hurt has put this to good use in many films like Lost in Space and The Big Chill, but he is also effective in other kinds of roles like I Love You to Death, and David Cronenberg's psychological drama A History of Violence (2005), wherein, with less than 10 minutes of screen time, he plays the creepy mob boss Richie Cusack. That same year, Hurt could be seen as a mysterious government operative in Stephen Gaghan's ensemble drama about the politics of Big Oil, Syriana.

Hurt has most recently been seen in the mini-series adaptation of Stephen King's Nightmares and Dreamscapes, in a piece entitled Battleground; he plays "Renshaw", a hitman who receives a package from the widow of a toymaker he killed, unaware of what is waiting inside for him. He is currently in the cast of "Vanya", an adaptation of Chechov's Uncle Vanya playing in the Artist Repertoire Theatre in Portland, Oregon.

Fluent in French, Hurt maintains a home outside Paris. He has a daughter with actress Sandrine Bonnaire and a son with Sandra Jennings, who sued Hurt in the late 1980s claiming she was his common-law wife. Hurt won the case. He was previously married to Mary Beth Hurt from 1971 to 1982 and lived with Marlee Matlin for a period in 1986. Hurt has two sons from his 1989-92 marriage to Heidi Henderson.

William Hurt as Leto Atreides I in the Dune miniseries
William Hurt as Leto Atreides I in the Dune miniseries
Awards
Preceded by
F. Murray Abraham
for Amadeus
Academy Award for Best Actor
1985
for Kiss of the Spider Woman
Succeeded by
Paul Newman
for The Color of Money

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