Laura Linney

Acting

Laura Linney

Born 1964-02-05 · Manhattan, New York City, New York, USA

Laura Leggett Linney (born February 5, 1964) is an American actress. She is the recipient of several awards, including two Golden Globe Awards and four Primetime Emmy Awards, and has been nominated for three Academy Awards and five Tony Awards. Linney made her Broadway debut in 1990 before going on to receive Tony Award nominations for the 2002 revival of The Crucible, the original Broadway productions of Sight Unseen (2004), Time Stands Still (2010), My Name Is Lucy Barton (2020), and the 2017 revival of The Little Foxes. On television, she won her first Emmy Award for the television film Wild Iris (2001), and had subsequent wins for the sitcom Frasier (2003–04) and the miniseries John Adams (2008). From 2010 to 2013, she starred in the Showtime series The Big C, which won her a fourth Emmy in 2013, and from 2017 to 2022 she starred in the Netflix crime series Ozark. Linney is also an established film actress. She made her film debut with a minor role in Lorenzo's Oil (1992) and went on to receive Academy Award nominations for the dramas You Can Count on Me (2000), Kinsey (2004), and The Savages (2007). She's also known for her performances in Primal Fear (1996), The Truman Show (1998), Mystic River and Love Actually (both 2003), The Squid and the Whale (2005), The Nanny Diaries (2007), Hyde Park on Hudson (2012), Mr. Holmes (2015), Sully and Nocturnal Animals (both 2016).

Acting credits

The Truman Show poster
8.2

In a picture-perfect seaside town, an insurance salesman begins to realize that his entire existence may be staged and observed by a vast unseen audience as part of a long-running real-time reality TV show.

The Truman Show

1998

Primal Fear poster
7.7

Defense attorney Martin Vail takes on jobs for money and prestige rather than any sense of the greater good. His latest case involves an altar boy, accused of brutally murdering the archbishop of Chicago. Vail finds himself up against his ex-pupil and ex-lover, but as the case progresses and the Church's dark secrets are revealed, Vail finds that what appeared a simple case takes on a darker, more dangerous aspect.

Primal Fear

1996

Mystic River poster
7.7

The lives of three men who were childhood friends are shattered when one of them suffers a family tragedy.

Mystic River

2003

Love Actually poster
7.1

Eight very different couples deal with their love lives in various loosely interrelated tales all set during a frantic month before Christmas in London.

Love Actually

2003

Sully poster
7.2

On 15 January 2009, the world witnessed the 'Miracle on the Hudson' when Captain 'Sully' Sullenberger glided his disabled plane onto the Hudson River, saving the lives of all 155 souls aboard. However, even as Sully was being heralded by the public and the media for his unprecedented feat of aviation skill, an investigation was unfolding that threatened to destroy his reputation and career.

Sully

2016

The Exorcism of Emily Rose poster
6.6

When a younger girl called Emily Rose dies, everyone puts blame on the exorcism which was performed on her by Father Moore prior to her death. The priest is arrested on suspicion of murder. The trial begins with lawyer Erin Bruner representing Moore, but it is not going to be easy, as no one wants to believe what Father Moore says is true.

The Exorcism of Emily Rose

2005

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out of the Shadows poster
6.1

After supervillain Shredder escapes custody, he joins forces with mad scientist Baxter Stockman and two dimwitted henchmen, Bebop and Rocksteady, to unleash a diabolical plan to take over the world. As the Turtles prepare to take on Shredder and his new crew, they find themselves facing an even greater evil with similar intentions: the notorious Krang.

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out of the Shadows

2016

The Life of David Gale poster
7.4

A man against capital punishment is accused of murdering a fellow activist and is sent to death row.

The Life of David Gale

2003

Nocturnal Animals poster
7.4

Susan Morrow receives a book manuscript from her ex-husband – a man she left 20 years earlier – asking for her opinion of his writing. As she reads, she is drawn into the fictional life of Tony Hastings, a mathematics professor whose family vacation turns violent.

Nocturnal Animals

2016

The Mothman Prophecies poster
6.2

Reporter John Klein is plunged into a world of impossible terror when fate draws him to the sleepy West Virginia town of Point Pleasant, whose residents are being visited by a great winged shape that sows hideous nightmares and fevered visions.

The Mothman Prophecies

2002

Mr. Holmes poster
6.5

In 1947, long-retired and near the end of his life, Sherlock Holmes grapples with an unreliable memory and must rely on his housekeeper's son as he revisits the still-unsolved case that led to his retirement.

Mr. Holmes

2015

Arthur Christmas poster
6.8

For hundreds of years, the Claus family has delegated the title "Santa" to a chosen few of its members, which can be passed down upon retirement. Each Christmas, Santa and his vast army of highly trained elves produce gifts and distribute them around the world in a one-night high-tech operation. However, when one of 600 million children to receive a gift from Santa on Christmas Eve is missed, it is deemed ‘acceptable’ to all but one—Arthur Claus, the current Santa’s misfit son deemed ineligible for the title, who executes an unauthorised rookie mission to get the last present halfway around the globe before dawn on Christmas morning.

Arthur Christmas

2011

Congo poster
5.6

Eight people embark on an expedition into the Congo, a mysterious expanse of unexplored Africa, where human greed and the laws of nature have gone berserk.

Congo

1995

Euphoria: A Look Back poster
4.1

The cast and crew of HBO's Euphoria take an exclusive look back at the critically acclaimed series' origins, evolution, and influences.

Euphoria: A Look Back

2026

Absolute Power poster
6.7

A master thief coincidentally is robbing a house where a murder—in which the President of the United States is involved—occurs in front of his eyes. He is forced to run, while holding evidence that could convict the President.

Absolute Power

1997

The Fifth Estate poster
6.0

A look at the relationship between WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange and his early supporter and eventual colleague Daniel Domscheit-Berg, and how the website's growth and influence led to an irreparable rift between the two friends.

The Fifth Estate

2013

Breach poster
6.6

Eric O'Neill, a low-level surveillance expert with the FBI, believes he is accomplishing his dream of becoming a full-fledged agent, with his unexpected promotion and assignment to clerk for Robert Hanssen, a renowned senior agent with 25 years in the FBI. However, he soon learns the reason for his promotion is to gain Hanssen's trust and find proof that he is a traitor to the country. Determined to draw the suspected double-agent out of deep cover, O'Neill finds himself in a lethal game of spy vs. spy, where nothing is as it seems.

Breach

2007

The Nanny Diaries poster
6.4

A college graduate goes to work as a nanny for a rich New York family. Ensconced in their home, she has to juggle their dysfunction, a new romance, and the spoiled brat in her charge.

The Nanny Diaries

2007

The Squid and the Whale poster
7.0

Based on the true childhood experiences of Noah Baumbach and his brother, The Squid and the Whale tells the touching story of two young boys dealing with their parents' divorce in Brooklyn in the 1980s.

The Squid and the Whale

2005

Searching for Bobby Fischer poster
7.1

A seven-year-old chess prodigy refuses to harden himself in order to become a champion like the famous but unlikable Bobby Fischer.

Searching for Bobby Fischer

1993

Suncoast poster
6.7

While caring for her brother along with her audacious mother, a teenager strikes up an unlikely friendship with an eccentric activist who is protesting one of the most landmark medical cases of all time.

Suncoast

2024

Genius poster
6.5

New York in the 1920s. Max Perkins, a literary editor is the first to sign such subsequent literary greats as Ernest Hemingway and F. Scott Fitzgerald. When a sprawling, chaotic 1,000-page manuscript by an unknown writer falls into his hands, Perkins is convinced he has discovered a literary genius.

Genius

2016

Dave poster
6.6

A sweet-natured Temp Agency operator and amateur Presidential look-alike is recruited by the Secret Service to become a temporary stand-in for the President of the United States.

Dave

1993

Kinsey poster
6.6

Kinsey is a portrait of researcher Alfred Kinsey, driven to uncover the most private secrets of a nation. What begins for Kinsey as a scientific endeavor soon takes on an intensely personal relevance, ultimately becoming an unexpected journey into the mystery of human behavior.

Kinsey

2004