Linda Hamilton

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_Hamilton

Linda Carroll Hamilton (born September 26, 1956) is an American actress best known for her portrayal of Sarah Connor in The Terminator film series and Catherine Chandler in the television series Beauty and the Beast (1987-1990), for which she was nominated for two Golden Globe Awards and an Emmy Award. She also starred as Vicky in the horror film Children of the Corn. Hamilton had a recurring role as Mary Elizabeth Bartowski on NBC's Chuck.

Linda Carroll Hamilton is an American actress best known for her portrayal of Sarah Connor in The Terminator and its sequel Terminator 2: Judgment Day and Catherine Chandler in the television series Beauty and the Beast, for which she was nominated for two Golden Globes and an Emmy.

Hamilton’s physician father died in a car accident when she was five. Her mother married the fire chief of Salisbury, MD. She and her siblings were raised in a "very boring, white Anglo-Saxon" family, and "voraciously read books" during her spare time.

She began her acting career with local children's theater groups. After college training and dramatic lessons conducted by former director Nicholas Ray, Hamilton was cast in a handful of inexpensive film programs. She briefly costarred in the prime-time TV soap opera Secrets of Midland Heights (1980) which led to an equally short stint on the weekly series King's Crossing (1982).

Hamilton's stock in the film industry rose substantially when she was cast as Sarah Connor, the target for the homicidal intentions of futuristic android Arnold Schwarzenegger in The Terminator (1984). Following The Terminator, Hamilton starred in Black Moon Rising, an action thriller starring Tommy Lee Jones. She then returned to television in the mystery series Murder, She Wrote, scoring favorable reviews. Hamilton then starred opposite Ron Perlman in the TV series Beauty and the Beast. The series was critically acclaimed, and she received Emmy and Golden Globe nominations. Hamilton left the series in 1989 and it ended in 1990.

In 1991, no shivering ingenue, the agile and athletic Hamilton returned to the big screen as a formidable foe for the forces of evil in Terminator 2: Judgment Day, where at times she came off tougher than the "kinder, gentler" Arnold. The film was a smash at the box office, grossing over $500 million, more than any other film of that year. Hamilton underwent intense physical training to emphasize the character's transformation from the first film. Her identical twin sister Leslie Hamilton Gearren was Linda's double in Terminator 2. Hamilton received two MTV Movie Awards for her role in the film, one for Best Female Performance and the other for Most Desirable Female. She reprised the character, Sarah Connor, for the theme park attraction T2 3-D.

Following the success of the Terminator series, she hosted Saturday Night Live. She then returned to television in A Mother's Prayer (1997) playing a mother who lost her husband and is diagnosed with AIDS. She earned yet another Golden Globe nomination. In 1996, Hamilton filmed two motion pictures that were released one week apart in 1997: Shadow Conspiracy with Charlie Sheen and Dante's Peak with Pierce Brosnan. Shadow Conspiracy flopped at the box office, but Dante's Peak grossed $180 million and was one of the biggest commercial hits of the year. Hamilton has since appeared on the television shows Frasier (season 4 episode "Odd Man Out" as Laura) and According to Jim and has done more TV movies, including On the Line, Robots Rising, Rescuers: Stories of Courage: Two Couples, Point Last Seen, and The Color of Courage.

Hamilton and her Beauty and the Beast costar Ron Perlman reunited in the 2005 post-Vietnam war drama Missing in America.

In 2009, she returned as Sarah Connor in Terminator Salvation, in voice-overs only.

In 2010, she joined the cast of Chuck in the recurring guest role of Mary Elizabeth Bartowski, a CIA agent and long-missing mother of Chuck and Ellie.

Hamilton has been married twice. Her first marriage was to actor Bruce Abbott, whom she wed on December 18, 1982. They had a son, Dalton (b. October 4, 1989), but divorced soon afterward. Her second marriage was to James Cameron, her director in the first two Terminator films. They had a daughter, Josephine Archer (b. February 15, 1993), before marrying on July 26, 1997. The marriage did not last long, ending in a costly divorce.