Carol Kane

Carol Kane is an American actress and comedian born on June 18, 1952. She first earned broad recognition in the 1970s for her dramatic film performances before establishing a long-standing career in screen comedy and theater. Over the course of her career, she has received an Academy Award nomination for Best Actress as well as two Emmy Awards for her television work.

Born in Cleveland, Kane was raised by her mother Joy, an educator and performing artist, and her father Michael, an architect. Her family relocated frequently during her childhood, including stays in Paris and Haiti. Following her parents' divorce when she was 12, she attended the Cherry Lawn School in Connecticut, later studying theater at New York's HB Studio and attending the Professional Children's School. She joined professional actors' unions at age 14 and made her stage debut in a 1966 production of The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie.

Kane transitioned to feature films as a teenager, appearing in minor roles in Desperate Characters and Carnal Knowledge in 1971. She secured her first leading role in Wedding in White in 1972 and co-starred in The Last Detail in 1973. Kane achieved major critical acclaim playing a Russian-Jewish immigrant in Joan Micklin Silver's Hester Street (1975), earning her sole Academy Award nomination. That same year, she appeared in the crime drama Dog Day Afternoon. Her remaining 1970s feature credits included Annie Hall, The World's Greatest Lover, When a Stranger Calls, and La Sabina, for which she won a CEC Award.

In 1980, Kane joined the cast of the sitcom Taxi as Simka Dahblitz-Gravas, a performance that earned her two Emmy Awards and initiated her transition into predominantly comedic roles. During the 1980s, she appeared in television programs such as Cheers and All Is Forgiven, while also appearing in notable comedy films including Ishtar, The Princess Bride, Scrooged, and My Blue Heaven.

Throughout the 1990s and 2000s, Kane worked consistently across television, film, and live theater. She was a series regular on American Dreamer and Pearl, guest-starred on shows such as Seinfeld and Ellen, and portrayed Grandmama in Addams Family Values (1993). In stage performance, she portrayed Madame Morrible in Broadway and touring productions of the musical Wicked between 2005 and 2014, and appeared in revivals of The Children's Hour in London and Harvey on Broadway.

Kane returned to a main television role in 2015 as Lillian Kaushtupper in the Netflix comedy series Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, starring on the show through 2020. She held additional television roles in Gotham, Los Espookys, Hunters, and joined Star Trek: Strange New Worlds in 2023 as Chief Engineer Pelia. Her later feature film projects include The Sisters Brothers, The Dead Don't Die, and Between the Temples (2024), receiving a New York Film Critics Circle Award for the latter. In her personal life, Kane was in a relationship with actor Woody Harrelson in the late 1980s, has never married, and is featured alongside her mother in the 2025 documentary Carol & Joy.