Cynthia Nixon

Cynthia Nixon is an American actress, activist, and theatre director. She is best known for her portrayal of lawyer Miranda Hobbes in the HBO series Sex and the City (1998–2004), its feature film continuations Sex and the City (2008) and Sex and the City 2 (2010), and the revival show And Just Like That... (2021–2025). Over her career, she has received two Primetime Emmy Awards, two Tony Awards, and a Grammy Award, making her one of few performers to win three of the four major American entertainment awards. She has also been nominated for six Golden Globe Awards.

Nixon was born in the Manhattan borough of New York City, the only child of radio journalist Walter Elmer Nixon Jr. and actress Anne Elizabeth Knoll. After her parents divorced when she was six years old, she was raised by her mother, who worked on the game show To Tell the Truth. Nixon made her first onscreen appearance at age eight on the show. She attended Hunter College Elementary School and Hunter College High School before earning a B.A. in English Literature from Barnard College, funding her education through her acting roles. She also participated in the Semester at Sea program in 1986.

Nixon began her professional acting career at age 12 in the 1979 television special The Seven Wishes of a Rich Kid, followed by her feature film debut in Little Darlings (1980) and her Broadway debut in a 1980 revival of The Philadelphia Story. In 1984, while a freshman at Barnard, she simultaneously performed in two Broadway plays directed by Mike Nichols: The Real Thing and Hurlyburly. Her early screen credits include Amadeus (1984), The Manhattan Project (1986), Addams Family Values (1993), and Marvin's Room (1996). She also appeared in stage productions such as Angels in America (1994) and Indiscretions (1995), receiving a Tony nomination for the latter, and co-founded the Off-Broadway troupe Drama Dept.

Nixon gained wide recognition as Miranda Hobbes on Sex and the City, earning three Emmy nominations and winning Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series in 2004. She subsequently starred in movies such as Advice from a Caterpillar (2000) and Igby Goes Down (2002), and portrayed Eleanor Roosevelt in the television film Warm Springs (2005), earning an Emmy nomination. She won her first Tony Award for Best Actress in a Play for Rabbit Hole in 2006. Nixon later won a guest actress Emmy for Law & Order: Special Victims Unit in 2008 and a Grammy Award for Best Spoken Word Album for An Inconvenient Truth in 2009.

In 2012, Nixon starred in the Broadway production of Wit, receiving a Tony nomination, and appeared in the miniseries World Without End. She earned acclaim for film roles in Stockholm, Pennsylvania (2015), James White (2015), and A Quiet Passion (2016), portraying poet Emily Dickinson in the latter. After playing Nancy Reagan in Killing Reagan (2016), she won a second Tony Award for the 2017 revival of The Little Foxes. Her recent screen work includes the Netflix series Ratched (2020), returning as Miranda Hobbes while executive producing And Just Like That..., and starring as Ada Brook in HBO's The Gilded Age (2022–present).

Alongside her acting career, Nixon is an active advocate for LGBT rights, public education, and women's health. A member of the Democratic Socialists of America, she has supported political figures including Bill de Blasio and Bernie Sanders. In 2018, Nixon launched a campaign challenging incumbent Andrew Cuomo in the Democratic primary for governor of New York. Her platform focused on universal health care, renewable energy, income inequality, criminal justice reform, and protecting undocumented children. She received 34% of the primary vote.