Linda Hamilton

March 28, 7:32 PMCelebrity Profile ExaminerAndy Williamson

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LINDA HAMILTON

Linda Hamilton has made a career portraying tough women who have to face their fear, endure adversity, overcome obstacles ... oh yeah, and terminate killer cyborgs from the future.

Linda Carroll Hamilton was born on September 26, 1956 in Salisbury, Maryland.  Her father, a physician, died in a car accident when Linda was five.  Linda has an identical twin sister, Leslie, as well as another older sister and a younger brother.  After graduating high school, Linda attended Washington College in Chestertown, Maryland.  While there, her drama professor told her that her acting aspirations were unrealistic and that nobody would hire her.  Linda quit school not long after and moved to New York where she studied under the legendary Lee Strasberg.

After finding a few roles in television movies, as well as a recurring character onHill Street Blues, Linda’s first big break came when she was cast in the film adaptation of Stephen King’s Children of the Corn.  The film was not very good, but it did make a profit (not to mention spawn a gazillion direct-to-video sequels).  It was enough, however, for Linda to get noticed by a budding director named James Cameron, who had her in mind for a little movie involving time travel and killer robots.

Cast as Sarah Connor in 1984’s The Terminator, alongside Arnold Swarzenegger and Michael Biehn, Linda more than held her own with her fellow actors.  The low-budget masterpiece would become a worldwide sensation, launch numerous careers, and spawn a series which would live on into the 21st century.

Though her next two films, Black Moon Rising and King Kong Lives, were neither critically or commercially successful (to put it mildly), Linda fared much better when, in 1987, she signed on to play Catherine Chandler in the CBS series Beauty and the Beast.  Costarring Ron Perlman, the hit show would run for three seasons (... during year three, Linda decided to leave the show, her character was killed off -- that was that).

LINDA HAMILTON AS SARAH CONNOR IN T2

In 1991, James Cameron asked Linda to reprise the role of Sarah Connor in Terminator 2: Judgment Day.  The film was another worldwide blockbuster, earning nearly $520 million around the globe.  Far from the innocent waitress that was Sarah Connor in the first film, Linda transformed herself into a lean, mean, robot-fighting machine -- the better to protect her wannabe-savior son, John.  Linda’s twin sister Leslie was her double in a couple of special effects shots where there were two Sarah Connors.  Linda would reprise the role of Sarah Connor once more for the Universal Studios theme park attraction T2 3-D.

While Linda’s subsequent films were nowhere near the success of T2, she did make some interesting films, including, Silent Fall, A Mother’s Prayer, Separate Lives, Shadow Conspiracy (a flop), and Dante’s Peak (a hit).  After that, Linda mainly stuck to TV fare, including roles on Frasier and According to Jim -- she also made a slew of television movies, many of which were Lifetime productions.

LINDA HAMILTON

Linda has been married twice.  First, to actor Bruce Abbott, from 1982 - 1989.  They have one son, named Dalton.  Linda also married her Terminator director James Cameron in 1997 after a romantic relationship sparked in 1991 during the making of T2.  They were divorced in 1999 after Linda discovered that Cameron was having an affair with actress Suzy Amis during the making of the his film Titanic.  Their divorce was the second-most expensive divorce next to that of Steven Spielberg and Amy Irving.  Linda walked away from the marriage with $50 million.  They have a daughter, Josephine Archer Cameron, born in 1993.

Unbeknownst to many, Linda suffered for years from bipolar disorder.  She has stated that her unstable mental condition destroyed her marriages, and that her verbal and physical abuse drove away her husbands.  Her love for her children caused her to seek treatment in 1996.  Linda now says she is grateful that she chose treatment and medication and regrets the pain her illness caused to those she loves.  (For more info about this, see this transcript of an interview Linda did with Larry King.)

Up next: Linda will do voiceover work as Sarah Connor in 2009’s Terminator: Salvation starring Christian Bale.

Linda Hamilton Quotes:

Talking about Sarah Connor:  "A woman who grows and transforms on screen is always a wonderful thing to play.  Sarah went from a vulnerable, normal girl to someone who finds all of her deep reservoirs of strength and comes through it all."

On her reaction to Arnold Swarzenegger being cast as the Terminator:  "I didn't take Schwarzenegger very seriously as an actor at that time.  I said, 'Oh Lord, why cast a man who looks like a machine as a machine?  Cast somebody who's very thin to do these superhuman acts.'  And I was wrong.  He was used tremendously effectively, and he was served very well by that film."

Regarding James Cameron after their divorce:  “I love him as much as I ever did.  But that doesn't mean that the heartache wasn't huge and I haven't suffered.  I knew how Jim was when I married him and I love him still.”

For more Terminator-related profiles, click here. 

LINDA HAMILTON