Performer
A performer whose catalogue work here is strong, with the fuller case still to be made.
Nutevio rank
#4057
of 909177 performers
Top 1%
Linda Hunt represents the rare performer whose career became more ambitious with every decade — 38 years in, and Linda is still choosing the harder script.
The essay
Our editors on the work, the patterns and the reason this body of work holds together.
Linda Hunt appears in 12 films in the Nutevio catalogue, and none of them would work the same way without Linda. Stranger Than Fiction is the clearest case: a film rated 7.3 by our editors, where the performance carries weight the script only implies.
The recognisable elements are versatility, transformation, quiet performance. Watch two of these films back to back and the method separates from the material — the same instrument, tuned differently for action, science fiction, adventure. It is a style built on what is withheld as much as what is played.
Working with Ron Howard, Marc Forster, Tom Shadyac and others, Linda Hunt helped set a standard other performers now audition against. Awards bodies have been slower than the work, which is usually the sign of a career built on choices rather than campaigns.
Stranger Than Fiction (2006) as Dr. Mittag-Leffler · Pocahontas (1995) as Grandmother Willow (voice) · Silverado (1985) as Stella
Career snapshot
Ranked #4057 of 909177 performers tracked in the Nutevio library.
Films in Nutevio
12
1980–2018
Career length
38 yrs
Measured across our catalogue
Academy Awards
—
Unknown
Oscar nominations
—
Unknown
Highest Nutevio score
7.3
Stranger Than Fiction
Average Nutevio score
6.4
Across catalogue work
Highest IMDb rating
7.3
Stranger Than Fiction
Most frequent director
Robert Altman
2 films together
Longest collaboration
2×
With Robert Altman
Most common genre
Adventure
5 titles
Average runtime
1h 52m
Across catalogue work
Golden Globe wins
—
Unknown
Nutevio metric
Ten weighted categories, applied identically to everyone we cover.
Nutevio Performer Score
6.9
out of 10
A performer whose catalogue work here is strong, with the fuller case still to be made.
Nutevio metric
Cultural impact and legacy, measured separately from craft — how far the work travelled once it left the cinema.
Nutevio Influence Score
6.6
out of 10
A quieter influence — felt inside the films rather than across the industry.
How far the work travelled past the people who saw it first.
What survives once the release-week conversation has burned off.
Institutional acknowledgement, weighted but never decisive.
Years of chosen, relevant work rather than years merely employed.
Statuettes, read as evidence rather than verdict.
Roles named without needing the film named alongside them.
Directors who wrote parts because this performer existed.
The reading other performers now have to answer.
Actor DNA
A fingerprint derived from the roles themselves — register, range and the kind of film they carry.
The shape of a career
Every performance plotted in time. Hover a point to read the title behind it.
Peak years
Where the scores, the awards and the sheer volume of work agree with each other.
Best decade
2000s
6.9 average MV
The 2000s are where the work and the material meet. Stranger Than Fiction, Dragonfly — the run our editors reach for first when the argument is about range rather than fame.
Highest average Nutevio score
2000s
6.9
Across 2 catalogue films in this decade, our scores never drop below the level a career is judged on.
Highest average IMDb rating
2000s
6.9
The public agrees most strongly about this stretch — useful context, and occasionally a decade behind our own reading.
Most awarded era
1980s
0 Academy Awards
Statuettes for the films themselves, which is the honest way to read an ensemble career. She-Devil, Silverado, Dune.
Most productive era
1980s
5 films
The busiest stretch of the catalogue — volume that reads as appetite rather than availability.
Range, mapped
Genres down the side, decades across the top. Warmer cells mean stronger titles.
| Genre | 1980s | 1990s | 2000s | 2010s |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Drama | 6.82 films | — | 6.92 films | — |
| Action | 6.43 films | — | — | 6.61 film |
| Thriller | — | — | 6.61 film | — |
| Comedy | 6.02 films | 5.72 films | 7.31 film | — |
| Romance | 6.71 film | 6.42 films | 7.31 film | — |
Chronology
Firsts and peaks
The turning points, in the order they happened.
First film in Nutevio
1980Popeye
Where our catalogue meets this career, as Mrs. Oxheart.
Highest rated performance · Career peak
7.3 on the Nutevio scale, the top of the catalogue for this performer. Weighing billing against the film's own quality, this is the point where everything aligned at once.
Most recent film
The current state of the argument, as Lady Proxima (voice).
Our order
Every performance in the catalogue, ordered by Nutevio Score.
Every title
Filter by genre or decade, and compare any two titles side by side.
12 of 12 films
as Dr. Mittag-Leffler
Directed by Marc Forster
as Grandmother Willow (voice)
Directed by Mike Gabriel
as Stella
Directed by Lawrence Kasdan
as Lady Proxima (voice)
Directed by Ron Howard
From the library
Every movie and TV credit stored for this name in the Nutevio catalogue — filter by media, role or sort by rating.
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The defining work
#1
Dr. Mittag-Leffler
Stranger Than Fiction (2006)
Performance score7.2
The performance the rest of the career is read through. Dr. Mittag-Leffler gives Linda Hunt a structure to work against, and the film hands over its centre of gravity without hesitation.
View movie#2
Billy Kwan
The Year of Living Dangerously (1982)
Performance score7.1
The Year of Living Dangerously asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. Billy Kwan is played without a single line of pleading for the audience's sympathy — which is exactly why it lands.
View movie#3
Grandmother Willow (voice)
Pocahontas (1995)
Performance score6.9
Pocahontas asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. Grandmother Willow (voice) is played without a single line of pleading for the audience's sympathy — which is exactly why it lands.
View movie#4
Stella
Silverado (1985)
Performance score6.7
Silverado asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. Stella is played without a single line of pleading for the audience's sympathy — which is exactly why it lands.
View movieStart here
A guided path through the work, ordered so each film explains the next.
Best entry point
as Dr. Mittag-Leffler
Start here. Stranger Than Fiction is the clearest statement of what Linda Hunt does — accessible, 113 minutes, and rated 7.3 by our editors. No context required.
Our editors order this path by accessibility first and chronology second. You meet Linda at the most legible performance, then move forward in time so each film reads as a response to the one before it rather than a repetition of it.
The Year of Living Dangerously (1982)
Keeps the romance register of Stranger Than Fiction but asks for a colder reading of it.
Silverado (1985)
Keeps the drama register of The Year of Living Dangerously but asks for a colder reading of it.
Pocahontas (1995)
A deliberate change of key after Silverado — same instrument, unfamiliar tuning, and the reason range gets mentioned.
Solo: A Star Wars Story (2018)
Keeps the adventure register of Pocahontas but asks for a colder reading of it.
Company kept
The directors and performers this career keeps returning to.
Robert Altman
Director
2 films together
Notably Popeye
Peter Weir
Director
1 film together
Notably The Year of Living Dangerously
David Lynch
Director
1 film together
Notably Dune
Lawrence Kasdan
Director
1 film together
Notably Silverado
Susan Seidelman
Director
1 film together
Notably She-Devil
Ivan Reitman
Director
1 film together
Notably Kindergarten Cop
Mike Gabriel
Director
1 film together
Notably Pocahontas
Bradley Raymond
Director
1 film together
Notably Pocahontas II: Journey to a New World
Tom Shadyac
Director
1 film together
Notably Dragonfly
Marc Forster
Director
1 film together
Notably Stranger Than Fiction
Ron Howard
Director
1 film together
Notably Solo: A Star Wars Story
Behind the camera
Who casts this performer, how often, and what the pairing produces.
Robert Altman
Director
2 films together · 5.6 avg MV
A working relationship rather than a booking — 2 films, and the register shifts each time.
Best film together
PopeyeMarc Forster
Director
1 film together · 7.3 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Stranger Than FictionMike Gabriel
Director
1 film together · 7.0 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
PocahontasLawrence Kasdan
Director
1 film together · 6.8 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
SilveradoPeter Weir
Director
1 film together · 6.7 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
The Year of Living DangerouslyRon Howard
Director
1 film together · 6.6 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Solo: A Star Wars StoryTom Shadyac
Director
1 film together · 6.6 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
DragonflyDavid Lynch
Director
1 film together · 6.4 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
DuneIvan Reitman
Director
1 film together · 6.1 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Kindergarten CopSusan Seidelman
Director
1 film together · 6.0 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
She-DevilBradley Raymond
Director
1 film together · 5.8 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Pocahontas II: Journey to a New WorldSix degrees
Follow the thread outward — director, film, co-star, and the film after that.
Categories of our own
Six editorial categories we apply to every performer we cover.
Most rewatchable
Stranger Than Fiction
as Dr. Mittag-Leffler
The one that survives a fourth viewing. Nothing in the performance depends on surprise, which is why it keeps paying out.
Most emotional performance
Stranger Than Fiction
as Dr. Mittag-Leffler
Grief played at conversational volume. The film never asks the audience to cry; the performance simply makes it difficult not to.
Most influential performance
Stranger Than Fiction
as Dr. Mittag-Leffler
You can hear this reading in other actors' auditions a decade later — the surest measure of influence there is.
Best ensemble performance
Dragonfly
as Sister Madeline
Work that makes everyone else in the frame better without ever pulling the camera towards itself.
Career defining performance
Stranger Than Fiction
as Dr. Mittag-Leffler
If the career had to be argued in a single scene, our editors would pick one from this film and rest the case.
In their films' words
“You can build a whole film around a performer who knows when not to speak. Linda Hunt has known it for a long time.”
Head to head
Put two careers on the same scale and see where the argument actually sits.
Ours alone
Recognitions handed out by this desk, on criteria no awards body uses.
Career Achievement
Awarded
38 years of relevant work — not merely a long career, but a long career of choices.
Modern Classic Performer
Awarded
Defining performances delivered inside the last twenty-five years, in films already being taught rather than merely remembered.
Adventure Legend
Awarded
5 catalogue titles in adventure, each one a reference point for the films that followed.
Our desk
Best ending, best opening, best twist and the rest — categories we apply to everyone we cover.
Best ending
Stranger Than Fiction
as Dr. Mittag-Leffler
The last five minutes reorganise everything before them, and hold up when you already know what's coming.
Best opening
Silverado
as Stella
A first sequence that states the rules of the film without explaining a single one of them.
Most emotional
Stranger Than Fiction
as Dr. Mittag-Leffler
The film where the technique steps aside and lets the feeling arrive undefended.
Best twist
Dragonfly
as Sister Madeline
A reversal earned by information the film gave you and trusted you to misread.
Best visual achievement
Silverado
as Stella
Images that would survive with the sound switched off.
Best action sequence
Solo: A Star Wars Story
as Lady Proxima (voice)
Geography, stakes and consequence held in the same frame — spectacle you can follow.
Best dialogue
Stranger Than Fiction
as Dr. Mittag-Leffler
Lines written to be spoken, staged so the pauses do half the work.
Most underrated film
Popeye
as Mrs. Oxheart
The public vote sits below ours on this one, and the direction is the reason for the gap.
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Michael Caine
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David Krumholtz
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Have your say
Community
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Reference
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